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Portrait of Lord Lytton. 



THE 



POETICAL WORKS 



OP 



OWEN MEREDITH 

(ROBERT, LORD LYTTON). 



" LUCILE," " THE APPLE OF LIFE." " THE WANDERER," " CLYTEMNESTRA, 

ETC., ETC. 



HOUSEHOLD EDITION. 



NEW YORK . 
JOHN WURTELE LOVELL, PUBLISHER, 

14 & 16 AsTOB Place. 
1880 



pP A^^/nO 



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4 8 6 5 5 5 

JUL 2 4 1942 



CONTENTS 



LITCILE 



i 



THE APPLE OF LIFE 02 

THE WANDERER. 

Dedication. To .T. F : . . . . 172 

Prologue. Part 1 174 

" II 179 

" III 181 

Book I. In Italy. 

The ;\Iagic Land 185 

Desire 186 

Fatality ,. 187 

A Vision 188 

Eros 189 

Indian Love-Song 190 

Morning and Meeting I'JO 

The Cloud 191 

Root and Leaf 192 

Warnings 192 

A Fancy 193 

Once 194 

Since • 19.5 

A Lovo-Letter 197 

Condemned Ones 200 

The Storm 201 

The Vampire 203 

Chancre •. 204 

A Chain to wear 205 

Silence 206 

News 207 

Count Rinaldo Rinaldi 207 

The Last Message 209 

Venice 209 

On the Sea 210 

Book II. In France. 

" Prensus in .-Egjeo " 212 

Al'Entresol 213 

Terra Incognita 214 

A Rem nibranee 515 

Madame la Marquise 216 

The Novel 217 

Au.x Italiens 218 

Progress 220 

The Portrait 221 

Astarte 222 

At Home during the Ball 224 

At Home after the Ball 225 

AuCafe*** 226' 



PAGE. 

The Chess-Board 231 

Song 232 

The Last Remonstrance 232 

Sorcery. To 234 

Adieu, Migiionne, ma Belle .. .. 234 

To Mignonne 235 

Compensation 236 

Translations from Peter Ron- 
sard ; 
" Voici le Bois que Ma Saincte 

Angelette" 237 

" Cache pour cette Nuict " 237 

" Page suy Moy " 237 

" Les Espices sont 4 Ceres " 238 

" Ma Douce Jouvence " 238 

Book III. In England. 

The Aloe 238 

" Medio de Fonte Leporum " 240 

The Death of King Hacon 240 

" Carpe Diem " 241 

The Fount of Truth 242 

INlidges , 243 

The Last Time that I met Lady 

Ruth 245 

Matrimonial Counsels 246 

See-Saw 247 

Babylonia 248 

Book IV. In Switzerland 

The Heart and Nature 251 

A Quiet Moment 252 

Nasniae 253 

Book V. In Holland. 

Autumn 255 

Leafless Hours 255 

On my Twenty-fourth Year 255 

Jacqueline . . ." 256 

Macromicros 259 

INfystery 260 

The Canticle of Love 265 

The Pedler 265 

A Ghost Story 267 

Small People 267 

Metempsychosis. . ..• 267 

To the Queen of Serpents 268 

Bluebeard 2G7 

Fatima 269 ) 

Going back again 269 

The Castle of King Macbeth..... 269 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE. 

Death-in-Lif e 270 

King Ijiinos 270 

Tlie Fugitive 271 

The Shore 271 

The North Sea 272 

A Night in the Fisheimau'a Hut: 
Part 1. The Fisherman's 

J)augliter 273 

" II. Tlie Legend of Lord 

Kosencrautz 275 

" III. Daybreak 277 

" VI. Breakfast 278 

A Dream 279 

Kin" Solomon 279 

Cordelia -. 281 

" Ye seek Jesus of Nazareth 

which was crucified " 282 

To Cordelia 283 

A Letter to Cordelia 285 

Failure 286 

Misanthropes 287 

Book VI. Palingenesis. 

A Prayer 288 

Euthanasia 289 

The Soul's Science 294 

A Psahn of Confession 294 

Kequiescat 299 

Epilogue. Part 1 299 

" 11 302 

" III 306 

TANNHAUSER. 

Tannhauser ; or, the Battle of 
the Bards 312 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

Clytemnestra 348 

Good-night in the Porch 397 

The Earl's Return 403 

A Soul's Loss 418 

The Artist . 421 

The Wife's Tragedy 424 



PAGE. 

MINOR POEMS. 

The Parting of Launcelot and 

Guenevere 434 

A Sunset Fancy 440 

Associations 440 

Meeting again 441 

Ari.-%tocracy 442 

The Merniaiden 442 

At her Casement 442 

A Farewell . 443 

An Evening in Tuscany 443 

Song 445 

Seaside Songs, i 445 

II 446 

The Summer-time that was 446 

Elayne le Blanc 447 

To • 452 

Queen Guenevere 452 

The Neglected Heart 453 

Appearances 453 

How the Song was made 454 

Retrospections 454 

The Voice across my Spirit falls. 454 

The Ruined Palace 455 

A Vision of Virgins 455 

Leoline 457 

Spring and Winter 458 

King Hermandiaz 459 

Song 459 

TheSwallow 460 

Contraband 460 

Evening 461 

Adoii 461 

The Prophet 461 

Wealth 462 

Want 462 

A Bird at Sunset 462 

In Travel 463 

Changes 463 

Judicium Paridis 464 

Night 468 

Song : 468 

Forbearance 469 

Helios Hyperionides 469 

Elisabett'a Sirani 469 

Last Words 473 



LUCILB. 

* 

Metrication. 

TO MY FATHER. 

I DEDICATE to you a work, wliich is submitted to the public with a diffidence and 
hesitation pioportioned to tlie novelty of the effort it represents. For in this poem I 
have abandoned those forms of verse with which I had most familiarized my thoughts, 
and have endeavored to follow a path on which I could discover no footprints before 
me, either to guide or to warn. 

There is a moment of profound discouragement which succeeds to prolonged effort; 
when, the labor which has become a habit having ceased, we miss the sustaining sense 
of its championship, and stand, with a feeling of strangeness and embarrassn;ent, be- 
fore the abrupt and naked result. As regards myself, in the present i)istance, the force 
of all such sensations is increased by the circumstances to which I have referred. And 
in this moment of discouragement and doubt my heart instinctively turns to you, from 
whom it has so often sought, from whom it has never failed to receive, support. 

I do not inscribe to you this book because it contains anything that is worthy of the 
beloved and honored name with which I thus seek to associate it: nor yet, because I 
would avail myself of a vulgar pretext to display in public an affection that is best 
honored by the silence which it renders sacred. 

Feelings only such as those with which, in days when there e.xisted for me no critic 
less gentle than yourself, I brought to you my childish m.anuscripts,— feelings only 
such as those which have, in later years, associated with your heart all that has moved 
or occupied my own,— lead me once more to seek assurance from the grasp of that hand 
which has hitherto been my guide and comfort through the life I owe to vou. 

And as in childhood, when existence had no toil beyond the day's simple lesson, no 
ambition beyond the neighboring approval of the night, I brought to vou the morning's 
task for the evening's sanction, so now 1 bring to you this self-appointed task-work of 
maturer years; less confident indeed of your approval, but not less confident of 
your love ; and anxious only to realize your presence between mvself and the )iublic, 
and to mingle with those severer voices to whose tint.1 sentence 1 submit my work the 
beloved and gracious accents of your own. 

OWEN MEREDITH. 



PART I 



CANTO I. 

I. 

Letter from the Comtesse de Nev- 
ERS to Lord Alfred Vargrave. 
" I HEAR from Bigorre you are there. 

I am told 
You are going to marry Miss Darcy. 

Of old, [it now, 

So long since you may have forgotten 
(When we parted as friends, soon 

mere strangers to grow,) 



Your last words recorded a pledge — 
what you will — 

A promise — the time is now come to 
fulfil. 

The letters I ask you, my lord, to re- 
turn, 

I desire to receive from your hand. 
You discern 

My reasons, which, therefore, I need 
not explain. 

The distance to Serchon is short. I 
remain 

(7) 



LUCILE. 



A month in these mountains. Miss 

Dai'oy, percliance, 
Will forego one brief page from the 

summer romance 
Of lier courtship, and spare you one 

day from your place 
At her feel, in tlie light of her fair 

English face. 
I desire notliing more, and I trust 

you will feel 
I desire notliing much. 

*' Your friend always, 

" LuciLE." 



II. 



Now in May Fair, of course, — in the 
fair month of May, — 

"When life is abundant, and busy, 
and gay : 

When the markets of London are 
noisy about 

Young hniies, and strawberries, — 
*' only just out : *' 

Fresh strawberi-ies sold under all the 
house-eaves, 

And young ladies on sale for the 
strawberry leaves : 

When cards, invitations, and three- 
cornered notes 

Fly about like white butterflies, — 
gay little motes 

In the sunbeam of Fashion ; and 
even Blue Books 

Take a heavj--winged flight, and grow 
busy as rooks ; 

And the postman (that Genius, in- 
different and stern. 

Who shakes out even-handed to all, 
from his urn, 

Those lots which so often decide if 
our day 

Shall be fretful and anxious, or joy- 
ous and gay), 

Brings, each morning, more letters 
of one sort or other 

Than Cadmus himself put together, 
to bother 

The heads of Hellenes ; — I say, in 
the season 

Of Fair Jlay, in May Fair, there can 
be no reason 



Why, when quietly munching your 
dry-toast and butter. 

Your nerves shoidd be suddenly 
thrown in a flutter 

At the sight of a neat little letter, 
addressed 

In a woman's liandwriting, contain- 
ing, half guessed. 

An odor of violets faint as the 
Spring, 

And coquettishly sealed with a small 
signet-ring. 

But in Autumn, the season of som- 
bre reflection. 

When a damp day, at bi'eakfast, be- 
gins with dejection ; 

Far from London and Paris, and ill 
at one's ease. 

Away in the heart of the blue Pyre- 
nees, 

Where a call from the doctor, a stroll 
to the bath, 

A ride through the hills on a hack 
like a lath, 

A cigar, a French novel, a tedious 
flirtation. 

Are all a man finds for his day's oc- 
cupation. 

The whole case, believe me, is total- 
ly changed, 

And a letter may alter the plans we 
arranged 

Over-night, for the slaughter of 
Time, — a wild beast. 

Which, though classified yet by no 
naturalist, 

Abounils in these mountains, more 
hard to ensnare. 

And more mischievous, too, than the 
lynx or the bear. 

III. 

I marvel less, therefore, that, having 

already 
Torn open this note, with a hand 

most unsteady, 
Lord Alfred was startled. 

The month is September ; 
Time, morning ; tbe scene at Bi- 

gorre ; (pray rcnicmiier 
These facts, gentle reader, because \ 

intend 



LUCILE. 



To fling all the unities by at the end. ) 
He walked to the window. The 

morning was chill : 
The brown woods were crisped in the 

cold on the hill : 
The sole thing abroad in the streets 

was the wind ; 
And the straws on the gust, like the 

thoughts in his mind. 
Rose, and eddied around and around, 

as though teasing 
Each other. The prospect, in truth, 

was unpleasing : 
And Lord Alfred, whilst moodily 

gazing around it, 
To himself more than once f vexed in 

soul) sighed 
..." Confound it !" 



What the thoughts were which led 

to this bad interjection, 
Sir, or Madam, I leave to your future 

detection ; 
For whatever they were, they were 

burst in upon. 
As the door was burst through, by 

my lord's Cousin John. 

Cousin John. 
A fool, Alfred, a fool, a most motley 
fool ! 

Lord Alfred. 
Who? 

John. 
The man who has anything better to 

do ; 
And yet so far forgets himself, so far 

degrades 
His position as Man, to this worst of 

all trades. 
Which even a well-brought-up ape 

were above, 
To travel about M'ith a woman in 

love, — 
Unless slie's in love with himself. 

Alfred. 

Indeed ! why 
Are you there then, dear Jack ? 



John. 

Can't you guess it? 

Alfred. 

NotL 
John. 

Because I liave nothing that's better 
to do. 

I had rather be bored, my dear Al- 
fred, by you. 

On the whole (I must own), than be 
bored by myself. 

That perverse, imperturbablCjgolden- 
liaired elf — 

Your Will-o'-the-wisp — that has led 
you and me 

Such a dance through these hills — 

Alfred. 

Who, Matilda ? 

John. 

Yes ! she, 
Of course ! who but she could con- 
trive so to keep 
One's eyes, and one's feet too, from 

falling asleep 
For even one half-hour of the long 
twenty-four ? 

Alfred. 
What's the matter ? 

John. 

Why, she is — a matter, the more 

I consider about it, tlie more it de- 
mands 

An attention it does not deserve ; 
and expands 

Beyond the dimensions which even 
crinoline. 

When possessed by a fair face and 
saucy Eighteen, 

Is entitled to take in this very small 
slar. 

Already too crowded, as I tliink, by ; 
far. I 

You read Malthus and Sadler ? ' 

Alfred. 

Of course. 



10 



LUCIL£. 



John. 

To what use, 

When you countenance, calmly, such 
monstrous abuse 

Of one mere human creature's legit- 
imate space 

In this world ? Mars, Apollo, Viro- 
rum ! the case 

\Vholly passes my patience. 

Alfked. 

My own is worse tried. 

John. 
Yours, Alfred ? 

Al,FKEr). 

Kead this, if you doubt, and decide. 

John (readmg the letter). 
" / hear from Ubjorre you are there. 

I am told 
You arc (/olny to marry Miss Bar cy. 

Of old— " 
What is this ? 

Alfked. 
Read it on to the end, and j'ou'll 
know. 

JoHX (continues reading). 
" When toe parted, your last loords 

recorded a vow — 
What you uill "... 
Hang it ! this smells all over, I 

swear, 
Of adventures and violets. Was it 

your hair 
You promised a lock of ? 

Alfred. 
Read on. You'll discern. 
John [contiimes). 
" Those letters I ask you, my lord, 

to return." . . . 
Humph ! . . . Letters ! . . . the 
matter is worse than I guessed ; 
I have my misgivings — 

Alfred. 

Well, read out the rest, 
And advise. 



John. 
Eh ? . . . Where was I ? . . . 

(Continues.) 
" Miss Darcy, perchance, 
Will forego one brief page from the 

.summer romance 
Of her courtship." . . . 

Egad ! a romance, for my part, 
I'd forego evei-y page of, and not 
break my heart ! 

Alfred. 

Continue ! 

John (reading). 
" yl«c? spare you one day from your 

place 
At her feet." . . . 
Pray forgive me the passing grim- 
ace. 
I wish you had my place ! 
(Heads.) 

" I trust you will feel 
I desire nothing much. Your 
friend "... 

Bless me! "Lwc;/;e"? 
The Comtesse de Nevers ? 

Alfred. 

Yes. 
John. 

What will you do ? 
Alfred. 
You ask me just what I would rather 
ask you. 

John. 
You can't go. 

Alfred. 
I must. 

John. 

And Matilda ? 

Alfred. 

O, that 
You must manage ! 
John. 
Must I ? I decline it, though, flat. 
In an hour the horses will be at the 
door, 



LUCILE. 



XI 



And Matilda is now in lier liabit. 

Before 
I liave finished m^ brealcfast, of 

course I receive 
A message for '' dear Cousin John ! " 

... I must leave 
At the jeweller's the bracelet whicli 

?/o« broke last night; 
I must call for the music. "Dear 

Alfred is right: 
The black shawl looks best : vnU I 

change it ? Of course 
I can just stop, in passing, to order 

the horse. 
Then Beau has the mumps, or St. 

Hubert knows what; 
Will J see the dog-doctor?" Hang 

Beau! I will not. 

Alfred. 
Tush, tush ! this is serious. 

John. 

It is. 

Alfred. 



You must think — 



Vei-y well, 



John. 
What excuse will you make, though ? 

Alfred. 

O, tell 
Mrs. Darcy that . . . lend me your 

wits. Jack! . . . the deuce! 
Can you not stretch your genius to fit 

a friend's use ? 
Excuses are clothes which, when 

asked unawares, 
Good Breeding to naked Necessity 

spares. 
You must liave a whole wardrobe. 

no doubt. 

John. 

My dear fellow ! 
Matilda is jealous, you know, as 
Othello. 



Alfred. 



1 



You joke. 



John. 
I am serious. Why go to Serchon ? 

Alfred. 
Don't ask me. I have not a choice, 

my dear John. 
Besides, shall I own a strange sort of 

desire. 
Before I extinguish forever the fire 
Of youth and romance, in whose 

shadowy light 
Hope whispered her first fairy tales, 

to excite 
The last spai'k, till it rise, and fade 

far in that dawn 
Of my days where the twilights of 

life were first drawn 
By the rosy, reluctant auroras of 

Love • 
In short, from the dead Past the 

gravestone to move; 
Of the years long departed forever to 

take 
One last look, one final farewell, to 

awake 
The Heroic of youth from the Hades 

of joy, 
And once more be, though but for 

an liour, Jack — a boy! 

John. 
You had better go hang yourself. 
Alfred. 

No I were it but 
To make sure that the Past from the 

Future is shut. 
It were worth the step back. Do 

you think we should live 
With the living so lightly, and learn 

to survive 
That wild moment in which to the 

grave and its gloom 
We consigned our heart's best, if the 

doors of the tomb 
Were not 'locked with a key which 

Fate keeps for our sake ? 
If the dead could return, or the 

corpses awake ? 

John. 
Nonsense ! 



12 



LUCILE. 



Alfred, 

Not wholly. The man who gets up 
A filled guest from the banquet, and 

drahis oil his cup, 
Sees the last lamp extinguished with 

cheerfulness, goes 
Well contented to bed, and enjoys 

its repose. 
But he who hath supped at the 

tables of kings, 
And yet starved in the sight of lux- 
urious things ; 
Who hath watched the wine flow, 

by himself but half tasted. 
Heard tlie music, and yet missed the 

tune : who hath wasted 
One part of life's grand iDossibill- 

ties , — friend, 
That man will bear with him, be 

sure, to the end, 
A blighted experience, a rancor 

Avithin : 
You may call it a virtue, I call it a 

sin. 

John. 

I see you remember the cynical story 
Of that wicked old piece of Experi- 

rience — a hoary 
Lothario, whom dying, the priest by 

his bed 
(Knowing well the unprincipled life 

he had led, 
And observing, Avith no small amount 

of surpi'ise. 
Resignation and calm in the old sin- 
ner's eyes) 
Asked if he had nothing that weighed 

on his mind * 
"Well, . . . no," says Lothario, " I 

think not. I find 
On reviewing my life, which in most 

things was pleasant, 
I never neglected, when once it was 

present. 
An occasion of pleasing myself. On 

the whole, 
I have naught to regret"; . . . and 

so, smiling, his soul 
Took its flight from this world. 



Alfred. 

Well, Regret or Remorse, 
Which is best ? 

John. 

Why, Regret. 

Alfred. 
No ; Remorse, Jack, of course ; 

For the one is related, to be sure, to 
the other. 

Regret is a spiteful old maid ; but 
her brother, 

Remorse, though a widower cer- 
tainly, yet 

7/os been wed to young Pleasure. 
Dear Jack, hang Regret! 

John. 
Bref I you mean, then, to go ? 

Alfred. 

Brefri do. 
John. / 

One word . . . stay ! 
Are you really in love with Matilda ? 

Alfred. 

Love, eh ? 
What a question ! Of course. 

John. 
Were you really in love 
With Madame de Nevers ? 

Alfred. 
What ; Lucile ? No, by Jove, 
Never really. 

John. 

She's pretty ? 

Alfred. 

Decidedly so. 
At least, so she was, some ten sum- 
mers ago. 
As soft and as sallow as Autumn,— 

with hair 
Neither black, nor yet brown, but 
that tinge which the air 



LUCILE. 



13 



Takes at eve in September, when 

night lingers lone 
Through a vineyard, from beams 

of a slow-selling sun. 
Eyes — tlie wistful gazelle's ; the fine 

foot of a fairy ; 
And a hand fit a fays wand to wave, 

— while and airy ; 
A voice soft and sweet as a time that 

one knows. 
Something in lier there was, set you 

thinking of those 
Strange l)ackgr()unds of Raphael . . . 

that hectic and deep 
Brief twiliglit in which southern 

suns fall asleep. 

JOHX. 

Coquette ? 

Alfred. 

Not at all. 'Twas her own fault. 
i'Jot she ! 

I bad loved her the better, had she 
less loved me. 

The heart of a man's like that deli- 
cate weed 

Which requires to be trampled on, 
boklly indeed, 

Ere it gives forth the fragrance you 
wisli to extract. 

'Tis a simile, trust me, if not new, 
exact. 

John. 
Women change so. 

Alfred. 

Of course. 

John. 

And, unless rumor errs, 
I believe that, last year, the Comtesse 
de Nevers * 

* O Shakespeare ! how couldst thou ask 
" What's in a name?" 

'Tis tlie devil's iu it when a bard has to 
frame 

Eiiglisli rhymes for nlliance with names 
that are Freiieli ; 

And in these rhymes 01 mine, well I know 
that 1 trench 

All too far on that license which critics re- 
fuse. 



Was at Baden the rage, — held an 

absolute court 
Of devoted adorers, and really made 

sport 
Of her subjects. 

Alfred. 
Indeed ! 

John. 
■\Ylien she broke off with you 
Her engagement, lier heart did not 
break with it '} 

Alfred. 
Pooh ! 
Pray would you have had her dress 

always in black, 
And shut lierseU' up in a convent, 

dear Jack ? 
Besides, 'twas my fault the engage- 
ment was broken. 

John. 
Most likely. How was it ? 

Alfred. 

The tale is soon spoken. 
She bored me. I showed it. Slie 

saw it. What next ':• 
She reproached. I relorted. Of 

course she was vexed. 
I was vexed that she was so. She 

sulked. So did I. 
If I asked her to sing, she looked 

ready to cry. 
I was contrite, " submissive. She 

softened. I hardened. 
At noon I was banished. At eve I 

was pardoned. 



With just right, to accord to a well-brought- 
up Muse. 

Yet, though faulty the union, in many a 
line, 

'Twixt my Brilish-born verse and my 
French heroine. 

Since, however auspiciously wedded they 
be, 

There is many a pair that yet cannot 
agree. 

Your forgiveness for this pair the author 
invites, 

Whom necessity, not inclination, unites. 



H 



LUCILE. 



She said I had no heart. I said she 

had no leason. 
I swore she talked nonsense. She 

sobbed 1 talked treason. 
In short, my dear fellow, 'twas time, 

as you see, 
Things should come to a crisis, and 

finish. 'Twas she 
I>y whom to that crisis the matter 

was brought. 
She released me. I lingered. I 

lingered, she thought, 
With too sullen an aspect. This 

gave me, of course. 
The occasion to fly in a rage, mount 

my horse, 
And declare myself iincomprehend- 

ed. And so 
We parted. The rest of the story 

you know. 

John. 
No, indeed. 

Alfred. 
Well, we parted. Of course we could 

not 
Continue to meet, as before, in one 

spot. 
You conceive it was awkward ? 

Even Don Ferdinando 
Can do, you remember, no more than 

he can do. 
I think that I acted exceedingly 

well, 
Considering the time when this rup- 
ture befell, 
For Paris was charming just then. 

It deranged 
All my plans for the winter. I asked 

to be changed, — 
Wrote for Naples, then vacant, — ob- 
tained it, — and so 
Joined my new post at once ; but 

scarce reached it, when lo ! 
My first news from Paris informs me 

Lucile 
Is ill, and in danger. Conceive what 

I feel. 
I fly back. I find her recovered, but 

yet 



Looking pale. I am seized with a 

contrite regret; 
I ask to renew the engagement. 

John. 

And she ? 

Alfred. 

Reflects, but declines. We part, 
swearing to be 

Friends ever, friends only. All that 
sort of thing ! 

We each keep our letters ... a por- 
trait ... a ring . . . 

With a pledge to return them when- 
ever the one 

Or the other shall call for them back. 

John. 

Pray go on. 

Alfred. 
My slor^' is finished. Of course I en- 
join 
On Lucile all those thousand good 

maxims we coin 
To supply the grim deficit found in 

our days, 
When Love leaves them bankrupt. I 

preach. She obeys. 
She goes out in the world ; takes to 

dancing once more, — 
A pleasure slie rarely indulged in 

before. 
I go back to my post, and collect (I 

must own 
'Tis a taste I had never before, my 

dear John) 
Antiques and small Elzevirs. Heigh- 

lio ! now, Jack, 
You know all. 

Joiix [afler a pause). 
You are really resolved to go back ? 

Alfred. 
Eh, where ? 

John. 
To that worst of all places,— the 
past. 
You remember Lot's wife ? 



\ 



LUCILE 



15 



Alfred. 
'Twas a promise when last 
We parted. My houoi- is pledged to it. 

John. 

Well, 
What is it you wish me to do ? 

Alfred. 

You must tell 
Matilda, I meant to have called — to 

leave word — 
To explain — but the time was so 
pressing — 

I John. 

My lord, 
Your lordship's obedient I 1 really 
can't do. . . 

, Alfred. 

I You wish then to break off my mar- 
riage ? 

John. 

No, no ! 
But indeed I can't see why yourself 

you need take 
These letters. 

Alfred. 
Not see ? would you have me, then, 

break 
A promise my honor is pledged to ? 

John (humming). 

" Of, off, 
Ana away ! said the s<?'OH</er ". . . 

Alfred. 

O, good ! O, you scoff ! 

John. 

At what, my dear Alfred ? 

Alfred. 
At all things ! 

John. 

Indeed ? 
Alfred. 
Yes ; I see that your heart is as dry 
as a reed : 



That the dew of your youth is rubbed 

off you : 1 see 
You have no feeling left in you, even 

for me ! 
At honor you jest ; you are cold as 

a stone 
To the Avarm voice of friendship. 

Belief you have none; 
You have lost faith in all things. 

You cany a blight 
About with you everywhere. Yes, 

at the sight 
Of such callous indifference, who 

could be calm ? 
I nnist leave you at once, Jack, or 

else the last balm 
That is left me inGilead you'll turn 

into gall. 
Heartless, cold, unconcerned. . . 

John. 

Have you done ? Is that all ? 
Well, then, listen to me ! I presume 

when you made 
Up your mind to propose to Miss 

Darcy, you weighed 
All the drawbacks against the 

equivalent gains, 
Ere you finally settled the point. 

What remains 
But to stick to your choice ? You 

want money : 'tis here. 
A settled position; 'tis yours. A ca- 
reer : 
You secure it. A wife, young, and 

pretty as rich, 
Whom all men will envy you. Why 

must you itch 
To be running away, on the eve of 

all this. 
To a woman whom never for once 

did you miss 
All these years since you left her ? 

Who knows what may hap ? 
This letter — to me — is a palpable 

trap. 
The woman has changed since you 

knew her. Piu'chance 
She yet seeks to renuw her youth's 

broken romance. 
When women begin to feel youth 

and their beauty 



i6 



LUCILE. 



Slip from them, they count it a sort 
of a duty 

To let nothing else slip away unse- 
cured 

Which these, while they lasted, 
might once have procured. 

Lucile's coquette to the end of her 
fingers, 

I will stake my last farthing. Per- 
haps the wish lingers 

To recall the once reckless, indiffer- 
ent lover 

To the feet he has left ; let intrigue 
now recover 

What truth could not keep. 'Twere 
a vengeance, no doubt — 

A triumph"; — but why must you 
bring it about ? 

You arc risking the substance of all 
that you schemed 

To obtain ; and for what ? Some 
mad dream you have dreamed ! 

Al.FIJED. 

But there's nothing to risk. You 

exaggerate, Jack. 
You mistake. In three days, at the 

most, I am back. 

Joim. 

Ay, but how ? . . . discontented, un- 
settled, upset, 

Bearing with you a comfortless 
twinge of regret ; 

Preoccupied, sulky, and likely 
enough 

To make your betrothed break off 
all in a huff. 

Three days, do you say ? But in 
three days who knows 

What may happen? I don't, nor 
do you, I suppose. 

V. 

Of all the good things in this good 

world around us, 
The one most abundantly furnished 

and found us, 
And which, for that reason, we 

least care about. 
And can best spare owx friends, is 

good counsel, no dovibt. 



But advice, when 'tis sought from a 
friend (though civility 

May forbid to avow it), means mere 
liability 

In the bill we already have drawn 
on Remorse, 

Which we deem that a true friend Is 
bound to indorse. 

A mere lectun? on debt from that 
friend is a bore. 

Thus, the better his cousin's advice 
was, the more 

Alfred Vargrave with angry resent- 
nu^nt opposed it. 

And, having the worst of the con- 
test, he closed it 

With so fiini a resolve his bad ground 
to maintain. 

That, sadly perceiving resistance was 
vain, 

And argument fruitless, the amiable 
jack 

Came to terms, and assisted his 
cousin to pack 

A slender valise (the one small con- 
descension 

Which his final remonstrance ob- 
tained), whose dimension 

Excluded large outfits ; and, cursing 
bis stars, he 

Shook hands with his fiiend and re- 
tux'ued to Miss Darcy. 

VI. 

Lord Alfred, when last to the v/in- 

dow he turned, 
Ere he locked up and quitted his 

chamber, discerned 
Matilda ride by, with her cheek 

beaming bright 
In what Virgil has^called " Youth's 

purpureal light " 
(I like the expression, and can't find 

a better). 
He sighed as he looked at her. Did 

"he regret her ? 
In her habit and hat, with her glad 

golden hair, [air, 

As airy and blithe as a blithe bird in 
And her arch rosy lips, and her 

eager blue eyes, 



TUCILE. 



17 



Willi their little impertinent look of 

surprise, 
And her loiind youthful figure, and 

fair neck, below 
The dark drooping feather, as 

i-adiant as snow, — 
I can only declare, that if I had the 

chance 
Of passing three days in the ex- 
quisite glance 
Of those eyes, or caressing the hand 

that now petted 
That fine English mare, I should 

much have regretted 
Whatever might lose me one little 

half-hour 
Of a pastime so pleasant, when once 

in my jiower. 
For, if one drop of milk from the 

bright Milky- Way 
Could turn into a woman, 'twould 

look, I dare say. 
Not more fresh than Matilda Mas 

looking that day. 



But, whatever the feeling that 

prompted the sigh 
With which Alfred Vargrave now 

watched her lide by, 
I can only affirm that, in watching 

her ride. 
As he turned from the window, he 

certainly sighed. 



CANTO II. 



Letter from Lonn Alfred Var- 

GKAVK to the COMTKSSE DE 

Nevers. 

"BiGORRE, Tuesday. 
" Your note. Madam, reached me 

to-day. at Bigorre, 
And commands (need I add?) my 

obedience. Befcn-e 
The nia;lit I sliall be at Serchon, — 

■where a line, 
If sent to Duval's, the hotel where I 

dine, 



Will find me, awaiting your orders. 

Keceive 
My respects, 

" Yours sincerely, 

'•A. Vargrave, 
"I leave 
In an hour." 

II. 

In an hour from the lime he wrote 

this, 
Alfred Vargrave, in tracking a 

mountain abyss. 
Gave the rein to his steed and his 

Ihougl.ts, and pursued, 
In pursuing his course through the 

blue solitude, 
The reflections that journey gave 

rise to. 

And here 
(Because, without some such pre- 
caution, I fear 
You might fail to distinguish them 

each from the rest 
Of the world they belong to ; whose 

captives are drest, 
As our convicts, precisely the same 

one and all, 
While the coat cut for Peter is passed 

on to Paul) 
I resolve, one by one, when I pick 

from the mass 
The persons I want, as before you 

they pass. 
To label them broadly in plain black 

and white 
On the backs of them. Therefore 

whilst yet he's in sight, 
I first label my hero. 

HI. 

The age is gone o'er 

When a man may in all things be all. 
AVe have more 

Painters, poets, musicians, and art- 
ists, no doubt, 

Than the great Cinquecento gave 
birth to; but out 

Of a mill ion of mere dilettanti, when, 
when 

Will a new Leonardo arise on our 
ken? 



i8 



LUCILE, 



He is gone with the age which begat 

him. Our own 
Is loo vast, and too complex, for one 

man alone 
To embody its purpose, and hold it 

shut close 
In the palm of his hand. There were 

giants in those 
Irreclaimable days ; but in these days 

of ours, 
In dividing the work, we distribute 

the powei's. 
Yet a dwarf on a dead giant's shoul- 
ders sees more 
Than the 'live giant's eyesight avail- 
ed to explore ; 
And in life's lengthened alphabet 

what used to be 
To our sires X Y Z is to us A B C. 
A Vanini is roasted alive for his 

pains, 
But a Bacon conies after and picks 

up his brains. 
A Bruno is angrily seized by the 

thi'otlle 
And hunted about by thy ghost, 

Aristotle, 
Till a More or Lavater step into his 

place : 
Then the world turns and makes an 

admiring grimace. 
Once the men were so great and so 

few, they appear. 
Through a distant Olympian atmos- 
phere, 
Like vast Caryatids upholdhig the 

age. 
Now the men are so many and small, 

disengage 
One man from the million to mark 

him, next moment 
The crowd sweeps him hurriedly out 

of your comment ; 
And since we seek vainly (to praise 

in our songs) 
'Mid our fellows the size which to 

hemes belongs, 
We take the whole age for a hero, in 

want 
Of a better ; and still, in its favor, 

descant 



On the strength and the beauty 
which, failing to find 

In any one man, we ascribe to man- 
kind. 

IV. 

Alfred Vargrave was one of those 

men who achieve 
So little, because of the much they 

conceive. 
With irresolute finger he knocked at 

each one 
Of the doorways of life, and abided 

in none. 
His course, by each star thai would 

cioss il, was set, [regret. 

And whatever he did he was sure to 
That target, discussed by the travel- 
lers of old. 
Which to one apjieared argent, lo 

one ai)peared gold, 
To him, ever lingering on Doubt's 

dizzy mai'gent. 
Appeared in one moment both golden 

and argent. 
The man who seeks one thing in life, 

and but one, |(!one : 

May hope to achieve it before life be 
But he who seeks all things, wher- 
ever he goes, 
Only reaps from the hopes which 

around him he sows 
A harvest of barren regrets. And 

the worm 
That crawls on in the dust to the 

definite term 
Of its creeping existence, and sees 

nothing more 
Than the path it pursues till its creep- 
ing be o'er, 
In its limited vision, is happier far 
Than the Ilalf-Sage, whose course, 

fixed by no friendly star, 
Is by each star distracted in turn, and 

who knows 
Each will still be as distant wherever 

he goes. 

V. 

Both brilliant and brittle, both bold 
and unstable. 

Indecisive yet keen, Alfred Var- 
grave seemed able 



LUCILE. 



19 



To dazzle, but not to illumine man- 
kind. 

A vigorous, various, versatile mind ; 

A cliaracter wavering, (itful, uncer- 
tain, 

As the shadow that shakes o'er a 
luminous curtain, 

Vague, tlitling, but on it forever im- 
pressing 

The sliape of some substance at 
whicli you stand guessing : 

When you said, "All is worlliless 
and weak liere," behold ! 

Into sight on a sudden there seemed 
to unfold [the man : 

Great outlines of strenuous truth in 

When you said, '* Tliis is genius," 
the outlines gi'ew wan. 

And his life, though in all tilings so 
gifted and skilled, 

Was, at l)est, biu a promise which 
nothing fuliilled. 



In the budding of youth, ere wild 
winds can dethiwer 

The shut leaves of man's life, round 
the germ of his power 

Yet folded, iiis life had been earnest. 
Alas ! 

In that life one occasion, one mo- 
ment, there was 

When this earnestness might, with 
the life-sap of youth, 

Lusty fruitage have l)oriie in his 
manhood's full growth; 

But it found him too soon, when his 
nature was still 

The delicate toy of too pliant a will. 

The boisterous wind of the world to 
resist, [wisdom. 

Or the frost of the world's wintry 
lie missed 

That occasion, too rathe in its ad- 
vent. 

Since then. 

He had made it a law, in his com- 
merce with men. 

That intenfity in him, vvliich only 
left sore [ignore. 

The heart it disturbed, to repel and 



And thus, as some Prince by his 

subjects deposed, 
Whose strength he, by seeking to 

crush it, disclosed. 
In resigning the power he lacked 

power to support. 
Turns his back upon courts, with a 

sneer at the court, 
In his converse this man for self- 

coniforl ;i])])calcd 
To a cynic denial of all he concealed 
In the instincts and feelings belied 

by his words. 
Words, however, are things ; and 

the man wlio accords 
To his language the license to out- 
rage his soul 
Is controlled by the words he dis- 
dains to control. 
And, therefore, he seemed in the 

deeds of each day, 
The light code proclaimed on his 

lips to obey ; 
And, the slave of each whim, fol- 
lowed wilfully aught 
That perchance fooled the fancy, or 

flattered the thought. 
Yet, indeed, deep within him, the 

spirits of truth. 
Vast, vague aspirations, the powers 

of his youth. 
Lived and breathed, and made moan 

— stiri ed themselves — strove 

to start 
Into deeds — though deposed, in that 

Hades, his heart. 
Like those anti(|ue Theogonies ru- 
ined and hurled 
Under clefts of the hills, which, 

convulsing the world. 
Heaved, in eartbi|uake, their heads 

the rent caverns above. 
To tronbhi at limes in the light court 

of Jove [lined awe 

All its frivolous gods, with an unde- 
Of wronged rebel powers that owned 

not their law. 
For his sake, I am fain to believe 

that, if born 
To some lowlier rank (from the 

world's languid scorn 



Secured by the world's stem resist- 
ance), where strife, 

Strife and toil, and not pleasure, 
gave purpose to life, 

He possibly might have contrived to 
attain 

Not eminence only, but worth. So, 
again, 

Had he been of his own house the 
tirst-born, each gift 

Of a miiul many-gifted had gone to 
uplift 

A great name by a name's greatest 
uses. 

But there 

He stood isolated, opposed, as it 
were. 

To life's great realities ; part of no 
plan ; 

And if ever a nobler and happier 
man 

He might hope to become, that alone 
could be when 

With all that is real in life and in 
men 

What was real in him should have 
been reconciled ; 

When each inlluence now from ex- 
perience exiled 

Should have seized on his being, 
combined with his natxu'e, 

And formed, as by fusion, a new hu- 
man creature : 

As when those airy elements view- 
less to sight 

(The amalgam "of which, if our sci- 
ence be right, 

The serm of this populous planet 
\loth fold) 

Unite in the glass of the chemist, be- 
hold ! 

Where a void f-eenied before there a 
substance appears. 

From the fusion of forces whence 
issued the spheres ! 



But the permanent cause why his 
life failed and missed 

The full value of life was,— where 
man should resist 



The world, which man's genius is 

called to command. 
He gave way, less from lack of the 

power to withstand. 
Than from lack of the resolute will 

to retain 
Those strongholds of life which the 

world strives to gain. 
Let this character go in the old- 
fashioned way. 
With the moral thereof tightly lacked 

to it. Say — 
" Let any man once show the world 

that he feels 
Afraid of its bark, and 'twill fly at 

his heels : 
Let him fearlessly face it, 'twill leave 

him alone : 
But 'twill fawn at liis feet if he 

flings it a bone." 

VIII. 

The moon of September, now half 
at the full. 

Was unfoldiug from darkness and 
dreamland the lull 

Of the quiet blue air, where the 
many-faced hills 

Watched, 'well-pleased, their fair 
slaves, the lisht, foam-fooled 
rills, 

Dance and sing down the steep mar- 
ble stairs of their courts. 

And gracefully fashion a thousand 
sweet sports. 

Lord Alfred (by this on his journey- 
ing far) 

Was pensively puffing his Lopez 
cigar, 

Aiul brokenly humming an old opera 
strain. 

And thinking, perchance, of those 
castles in Spain 

Which that long rocky barrier hid 
from his sight ; 

When suddenly, out of the neighbor- 
ing night, 

A horsenuin emerged from a fold of 
theliill. 

And so startled his steed, that was 
vvindiug at will 



LUCILE. 



4- 



Up the thin dizzy strip of a pathway 
whicli led 

O'er the luounlaiu — the reins on its 
neck, and its head 

Hanging lazily forward — that, hut for 
a hand 

Light and ready, yet tirm, in familiar 
command, 

Both rider and horse might have 
been in a trice 

Hurled liorribly over the grjm prec- 
ipice. 



As soon as the moment's alarm had 

subsided. 
And the oath, with which nothing 

can find unprovided 
A thoi'oughbred Englishman, safely 

exploded, 
Lord Alfred unbent (as Apollo his 

bow did 
Now and then) his erectness ; and 

looking, not ruder 
Than such inroad would warrant, 

surveyed the inl ruder, 
Whose arrival so nearly cut short in 

his glory 
My hero, and finished abruptly this 

story. 



The stranger, a man of his own age 
or less, 

Well mounted, and simple though 
rich in his dress. 

Wore his beard and mustache in the 
fasliion of France. 

His face, which was pale, gathered 
force from the glance 

Of a pair of dark, vivid, and eloquent 
eyes. 

With a gest of apology, touched with 
surprise. 

He lifted his hat, bowed and cour- 
teously made 

Some excuse in such well-cadenced 
French as betrayed, 

At the first word he spoke, the Pa- 
risian, 



XI, 

I swear 
I have wandered about m the world 

everywhere ; 
From many strange mouths liave 

heard many strange tongues ; 
Strained with many strange idioms 

my lips and my lungs ; 
"Walked in many a far land, regret- 
ting niy own ; 
In many a language groaned many 

a groan : 
And have often had reason to curse 

those wild fellows 
Who built the high bouse at which 

Heaven turned jealous, 
Making human audacity stumble and 

stannner 
When seized by the throat in the 

hard gripe of Grammar. 
But the language of languages dear- 
est to me 
Is that in which once, ma toute 

cherle. 
When, together, we bent o'er your 

nosegay for hours, 
You explained what was silently 

said by the flowers. 
And, selectine; the sweetest of all, 

sent a flame 
Through my heart, as, in laughing, 

you uuu'mured, Je Vainte, 



The Italians have voices like pea- 
cocks ; the Spanish 

Smell, I fancy, of garlic ; the Swed- 
ish and Danish 

Have something too Runic, too 
rough and unshod, in 

Their accent for mouths not descend- 
ed from Odin ; 

German gives me a cold in the head, 
sets me wheezijig 

And coughing ; and Russian is noth- 
ing but sneezing ; 

But by Belus and Babel ! I never 
have heard. 

And I never shall hear (I well know 
it), one word 



22 



LUCTLE. 



Of that delicate idiom of Paris witli- 
out 

Feeling morally sure, beyond ques- 
tion or doubt, 

By the wild way in which my heart 
inwardly fluttered 

That my heart's native tongue to my 
heart had been uttered. 

And whene'er I hear French spoken 
as I approve, 

I feel myself quietly falling in love. 

xiir. 

Lord Alfred, on hearing the stran- 
ger, appeased 

By a something, an accent, a ca- 
dence, which pleased 

His ear witli that pledge of good 
breeding wliich tells 

At once of the worid in M'hose fel- 
lowship dwells 

The speaker that owns it, was glad 
to remark 

In the horseman a man one might 
meet after dark 

Without fear. 
And thus, not disagreeably im- 
press 3d, 

As it seemed, witli each other, the 
two men abreast 

Rode on slowly a moment. 

XIV. 

Straxger. 

I see. Sir, you are 
A smoker. Allow me ! 

Alfred. 

Pray take a cigar. 
Stranger. 
Many thanks ! . . . Such cigars are a 

luxury here. 
Do you go to Serchon ? 

Alfred. 

Yes ; and you ? 
Stranger. 

Yes. I fear. 
Since our road is the same, that our 
journey must be 



Somewhat closer than is our ac- 
quaintance. You see 

How narrow the path is. I'm tempt- 
ed to ask 

Your iJerniission to finish (no dif- 
ficult task ! ) 

The cigar you have given me (really 
a prize ! ) 

In your company. 

Alfred. 
Charmed, Sir, to find your road lies 
In the way of my own inclinations ! 

Indeed 
The dream of your nation I find in 

this weed. 
In the distant savannas a talisman 

grows 
That makes all men brothers that 

use it . . . who knoMS ? 
That blaze which erewhile from the 

Boitlevart outbroke. 
It has ended where wisdom begins, 

Sir, — in smoke. 
Messieurs Lopez (whatever your 

publicists write) 
Have done more in their way human 

kind to unite. 
Perchance, than ten Proudhons. 

Stranger. 
Yes. Ah, what a scene ! 

Alfred. 

Humph ! Nature is here too preten- 
tious. Her mien 

Is too haughty. One likes to be 
coaxed, not compelled. 

To the notice such beauty resents if 
withheld. 

She seems to be saying too plainly, 
" Admire me ! " 

And I answer, " Yes, madam, I do: 
but you tire me." 

Stranger. 
That sunset, just now though . • . 

Alfred. 

A very old trick ! 
One would think that the sun by this 
time must be sick 



LUCILE. 



23 



Of blushing at what, by this time, 

he must know 
Too well to be shocked by — this 

world 

Stranger. 

Ah, 'tis so 
With us all. 'Tis the sinner that 

best knew the world 
At twenty, whose lip is, at sixty, 

most curled 
With disdain of its follies. You stay 

at ISerchon ? 

Alfred. 

A day or two only. 

Stranger. 

The season is done. 

Alfred. 
Already ? 

Stranger. 
'Twas shorter this year than the 

last. 
Folly soon wears her shoes out. She 

dances so fast. 
We are all of us tired. 

Alfred. 
You know the place well ? 
Stranger. 
I have been there two seasons. 
Alfred. 
Pray who is the Belle 
Of the Baths at this moment ? 

Stranger. 

The same who has been 
The belle of all places in which she 

is seen ; 
The belle of all Paris last winter ; 

last sprimj 
The belle of all Baden. 
Alfred. 

An uncommon thing ! 
Stranger. 
Sir, an uncommon beauty !....! 

rather should say. 
An uncommon character. Truly, 
each day 



One meets women whose beauty is 

equal to hers. 
But none with the charm of Lucile 

de Nevers. 

Alfred. 
Madame de Nevers ? 

Stranger. 

Do you know her ? 

Alfred. 

I know, 
Or, rather, I knew her — a long time 

ago. 
I almost forget . . . 

Stranger. 

"\Yliat a wit ! what a grace 
In her language ! her movements I 

what play in her face I 
And yet what a sadness she seems to 

conceal ! 

Alfred. 
You speak like a lover. 

Stranger. 

I speak as I feel, 
But not like a lover. What interests 

me so 
In Lucile, at the same time forbids 

me, I know. 
To give to that interest, whate'er the 

sensation, 
The name we men give to an hour's 

admiration, 
A night's passing passion, an ac- 

ti'ess's eyes, 
A dancing girl's ankles, a fine lady's 

sighs. 

Alfred. 
Yes, I quite comprehend. But this 

sadness — this shade 
Which you speak of '? ... it almost 

would make me afraid 
Your gay countrymen, Sir, less 

adroit must have grown. 
Since when, as a stripling, at Paris, 

I own 



24 



LUCTLE. 



I found in them toi'ril)le rivals, — if 
yet 

They have all lacked the skill to con- 
sole this regret 

(If re<;iet be tlie Avord I should use), 
or fulfil 

This desire (if desire be the word), 
wliieh seems still 

To enduic unappeased. For I take 
it for granted, 

From ail tliat you say, that the will 
was not wanted. 



Tlie stranger replied, not without ir- 
ritation : 

" I have lieard that an EnglisliTnan 
— one of your nation, 

I presume — ami if so, I must beg 
you, indeed, 

To excuse tlie contempt which I . ." 

Alfred. 

Pray, Sir, proceed 
With your tale. My compatriot, 
what was his crime ? 

STnANOIOR. 

O, nothing I His folly was not so 
sul)lime 

As to merit tliat term. If I Idamed 
him just now. 

It was not for the sin, but the silli- 
ness. 

Alfred. 

How? 
Stranger. 

I own I hate Botany. Still, ... I 
admit, 

Although I myself have no passion 
for it. 

And do not understand, yet I can- 
not despise 

The cold man of science, who walks 
with his eyes 

All alert through a garden of 
flowers, and strips 

The lilies' gold tongues, and the 
roses' red lii)s, 

With a ruthless dissection; since he, 
I suppose, 



Has some purpose beyond l!:e mere 

mischief he does. 
But the stupid and mischievous boy, 

that u))roots 
The cxolif s. and tramples the tender 

young shoots. 
For a i)oy's brutal pastime, and only 

because 
He knows no distinction 'twixt 

heartsease and haws, — 
One would wish, for the sake of eacli 

nursling so nipjied. 
To catch tilt! young rascal and have 

him well whipped ! 

Alfimcd. 

.Some compatriot of mine, do I then 

understand, 
With a cold Northern heart, and a 

rude English hand. 
Has injured your Kosebud of France? 

Stranger. 

Sir, I know 
But little, or nothing. Yet some 

faces show 
The last act of tragedy in their re- 
gard: 
Though the first scenes be wanting, 

it yet is not hard 
To divine, more or less, what the 

l)lot may have been. 
And what sort of actors have passed 

o'er the scene, 
And whenever I gaze on the face of 

Lucile, 
With its pensive and passionless 

languor, I feel 
That some feeling hath burnt 

there . . . burnt out, and burnt 

up 
Health and hope. So you feel when 

you gaze down the cup 
Of extinguished volcanoes : you 

judge of the fire 
Once there, by the ravage y( i see. — 

the desire. 
By the a])athy left in its wake, and 

that sense 
Of a moral, immovable, mute impo- 

teuce. 



LUCTLE. 



25 



Alfred. 
Humph I ... I see you liave finished, 

at last, your cigar. 
Can I offer another ? 

Stranoer. 

No, thank you. We are 
Not two miles from Serchon. 

ALFIiKO. 

You know the road well ? 

Stranger. 
I have often been over it. 

XVI. 

Here a pause foil 
On their converse. Still nuisingly 

on, side hy side, 
In the nioonli;:{lit, tlie two men con- 
tinued to ride 
Down tlie dim mountain patliway. 

But each, for the rest 
Of their journey, altliougli they still 

rode on al)rcast, 
Continued to follow in silence the 

train [ed his brain ; 

Of the different feelings tiiat haunt- 
And each, as though roused from a 

deep reverie, 
Ahnost shouted, descending the 

mountain, to see 
Burst at once on the moonlight the 

silvery Uaths, 
The long lime-tree alley, the dark 

gleaming paths. 
With the lamps twinkling through 

them — the quaint wooden 

roofs— 
The little white houses. 

The clatter of lioofs. 
And the music of wandering bands, 

up the walls 
Of the steep lianging hill, at remote 

intervals 
Reached them, crossed by the sound 

of the clacking of whips, 
And here and there, faintly, througli 

serpentine slijis 
Of verdant rose-gardens, deep-shel- 
tered with screens 



Of airy acacias and dark ev<'rgreens, 
Tlicy could mark the while dresses, 

and catch I lie ligh! songs, 
Of the lovely Parisians lliat wan 

deied m throngs, 
Led by Laughier and IjOvc tluough 

the cold eventide 
Down tlu^ dream-haunted valley, or 

up the hillside. 

xvir. 
At length, at tiie door of the inn 

I'Mkrisso.v, 
(Pray go there, if ever you go to Ser- 
chon!) 
The two horseiiuni, well pleased to 

have Hiaclied it, aliglit<;(l 
And exchanged tlicir last greetings 
The Frencliiiian invited 
Lord Alfred to dinner. Lord Alfred 

declined. 
He had letters to write, and felt 

tired. So he dmed 
In his own rooms that night. 

With an uiKiiiiet (!ye 
He watched his companion depart; 

nor knew why, 
Beyond all accountable reason or 

measure, 
He felt in his breast such a sovran 

displeasure. 
"The fi'llowjs good-looking," he 

niiuiiiured at last, 
"And yet not a coxcomb," Some 

gliost of the past 
Vexed liim still. 

" H be love her," he tbougbt, 

" let him win her " 
Then he turned to the future— and 

onb.'rod bis diiMujr. 

XVIII. 

O hour of all hours, the most blessed 

upon earth. 
Blessed hour of our dinners! 

The laiid of Ins birth. 
The face of his (irst love; the bills 

that In- owes; 
The twaddle f)f friends and the 

venom of foes; 
The sermon be beard when tochurcU 

he last went ; 



26 



LUCTLE 



The money he borrowed, the money 

he spent, — 
All of these things a man, I believe, 

may forget. 
And not be the worse for forgetting ; 

but yet 
Never, never, O never! earth's 

luckiest sinner 
Hath unpunished forgotten the hour 

of his dinner! 
Indigestion, that conscience of every 

bad stomach. 
Shall relentlessly gnaw and pursue 

him with some ache 
Or some pain; and trouble, remorse- 
less, his best ease. 
As the Furies once troubled the sleep 

of Orestes. 



We may live without poetry, music, 

and art ; 
We may live without conscience, and 

live without heart ; 
We may live without friends ; we 

may live without booi<s ; 
But civilized man cannot live with- 
out cooks. 
He may live without books,— what 

is knowledge but grieving ? 
He may live without hope, — what is 

hope but deceivkig ? 
He may live without love, — what is 

■passion but pining? 
But where is the man that can live 

without dining ? 



Lord Alfred found, waiting his com- 
ing, a note 

From Lticile. 

" Your last letter has reached me," 
she wrote. [the ball, 

" This evening, alas ! I must go to 

And shall not be at home till loo 
late for your call ; 

But to-morrow, at any rate, sans 
fante, at One 

You will find me at home, and will 
find me alone. 

Meanwhile, let me thank you sincere- 
ly, milord. 



For the honor with which you ad- 
here to your word. 

Yes, I thank you. Lord Alfred ! To- 
morrow, then. 

"L." 

XXI. 

I find myself terribly puzzled to tell 
The feeling with which Alfred Var- 

grave flung down 
This note, as he poured out his wine. 

1 must own 
That 1 think he himself could have 

hardly explained 
Those feelings exactly. 

" Yes, yes," as he drained 
The glass down, he muttered, 

" Jack's right, after all. 
The coquette ! " 

" Does milord mean to go to the 

ball?" 
Asked the waiter, who lingered. 

" Perhaps. I don't know. 
You may keep me a ticket, in case I 

should go," 

XXII. 

O, better, no doubt, is jT dinner of 
herbs. 

When seasoned by love, which no 
rancor disturbs. 

And sweetened by all that is sweet- 
est in life, 

Than tuibot, bisque, ortolans, eaten 
in strife I 

But if, out of humor, and hungry, 
alone, 

A man should sit down to a dinner, 
each one 

Of the dishes of which the cook 
chooses to spoil 

With a horrible mixture of garlic and 
oil. 

The chances are ten against one, I 
must own. 

He gets up as ill-tempered as when 
he sat down. 

And if any reader this fact to dis- 
pute is 

Disposed, I say. . . ^^ AUium edat 
ciciitis 

Nocentius .' " 



LUCILE. 



27 



Over the fruit and the wine 
Undisturbed the wasp settled. The 

evening was tine. 
Lord Alfred his chair by the window 

had set, cigarette. 

And languidly lighted his small 
The window was open. The warm 

air without 
Waved the flame of the candles. 

The moths were about. 
In the gloom he sat gloomy. 

XXIII. 

Gay sounds from below 
Floated up like faint echoes of joys 

long ago, 
And night deepened apace; through 

the dark avenues 
The lamps twinkled bright; and by 

threes, and by twos. 
The idlers of Serchon were strolling 

at will, 
As Lord Alfred could see from the 

cool window-sill, 
Where his gaze, as he languidly 

turned it, fell o'er 
His late travelling companion, now 

passing before 
The inn, at the window of which he 

still sat, 
In full toilet, — boots varnished, and 

snowy cravat, 
Gayly smoothing and buttoning a 

yellow kid glove, 
As he tmuied down the avenue. 

Watching above, 
From his window, the stranger, who 

stopped as he walked 
To mix with those groups, and now 

nodded, now talked. 
To the young Paris dandies, Lord 

Alfred discerned, 
By the way hats were lifted, and 

glances weie turned. 
That this unknown acquaintance, 

now bound for the ball. 
Was a person of rank or of fashion ; 

for all 
Whom he bowed to in passing, or 

stopped with and chattered. 
Walked on with a look which im- 
plied . . . "I feel flattered !" 



XXIV. 



His form was soon lost in the dis- 
tance and gloom. 



Lord Alfred still sat by himself in 

his room. 
He had finished, one after the other, 

a dozen 
Or more cigarettes. He had thought 

of his cousin : 
He had thought of Matilda, and 

thought bf Lucile : 
He had thought about many things; 

thought a great deal 
Of himself : of his past life, his fu- 
ture, his present : 
lie had thought of the moon, neither 

fidl moon nor crescent : 
Of the gay world, so sad ! life, so 

sweet and so sour ! 
He had thought, too, of glory, and 

fortune, and power : . 
Thought of love, and the country, 

and sympathy, and 
A poet's asylum in some distant 

land : 
Thought of man in the abstract, and 

woman, no doubt. 
In particular ; also he had thought 

much about 
His digestion, his debts, and his 

dinner ; and last. 
He thought that the night would be 

stupidly passed. 
If he thought any mure of such mat- 
ters at all : 
So he rose, and resolved to set out 

for the ball. 



I believe, ere he finished his tardy 

toilet, 
That Lord Alfred had spoiled, and 

flung by in a pet, 
Half a dozen white neckcloths, and 

looked for the nonce 
Twenty times in the glass, if he 

looked in it once. 



i «8 



LUCILE. 



I believe that he split up, in drawing 
them on, 

Three pair of pale lavender gloves, 
one by one. 

And this is the reason, no doubt, 
that at last, 
i When he reached the Casino, al- 
though he walked fast, 

lie heard, as he hurriedly entered 
the door, 

The church-clock strike Twelve. 



The last waltz was just o'er. 
The chaperons and dancers were all 

in a flutter. 
A crowd blocked the door : and a 

buzz and a mutter 
Went about in the room as a young 

man, whose face 
Lord Alfred had seen ere he entered 

that place. 
But a few hours ago, through .the 

perfumed and warm 
Flowery porch, with a lady that 

leaned on his arm 
Like a (jueen in a fable of old fairy 

days, 
Left the ballroom. 



'■ The hubbub of comment and praise 
; Reached Lord Alfred as just then he 
j entered. 

"uYafoi!" 
Said a Frenchman beside him. .... 
1 " That lucky Luvois 

i Has obtained all the gifts of the 
j gods . . . rank and wealth, 

I And good looks, and then such inex- 
j haustible health! 

j He that hath shall have more; and 
L this truth, I sunnise, 

j Is the cause why, to-night, by the 
j beautiful eyes 

I Of la charmante. Litcile more distin- 
i guished than all, 

I He so gayly goes off with the belle of 
the ball," 



" Is it true," asked a lady, aggres- 
sively fat, 
^Yho, fierce as a female Leviathan, 

sat 
By another that looked like a needle, 

all steel 
And tenuity, — "Luvois will marry 

Lucile?" 
The needle seemed jerked by a viru- 
lent twitch, 
As though it were bent upon driving 

a stitch 
Through somebody's character. 

" Madam," replied; 
Interposing, a young man who sat by 

their side, 
And was languidly fanning his face 

with his hat, 
' ' I am ready to bet my new Tilbury 

that, 
If Luvois has proposed, the Comtesse 

has refused." 
The fat and thin ladies were highly 

anuised. 
"Refused! . . . what! a young 

Duke, not thirty, my dear, 
With at least half a niillion (what is 

it ?) a year !"' 
" That may be," said the third; " yet 

Iknow some time since 
Castelmar was refused, though as 

rich, and a Prince. 
But Luvois, who was never before in 

his life 
In love with a woman who was not 

a wife, 
Is now certainly serious." 

XXIX. 

The music once more 
Recommenced. 

XXX. 

Said Lord Alfred, " This ball is a 

bore!" 
And returned to the inn, somewhat 

worse than before. 

XX XT. 

There, whilst musing he leaned the 
dark valley above. 

Through the warm land were wan- 
dering the spirits of love. 




" The last waltz was just o'er.' 



LVCILE. 



29 



A soft breeze in the white window 

drapery stirred ; 
In the blossomed acacia tlie lone 

cricket chirred ; 
The scent of the roses fell faint o'er 

the night, 
And the moon on the mountain M-as 

dreaming in light. 
Eepose, and yet rapture ! that pensive 

wild nature 
Impregnate with passion in each 

hreathhig feature ! 
A stone's-throw from thence, through 

the large lime-trees peeped. 
In a gai'den of roses, a white cludet, 

steeped 
In the moonbeams. The windows 

oped down to the lawn ; 
The casements were open ; the cur- 
tains were drawn ; 
Lights streamed from the inside ; and 

Avith them the sound 
Of music and song. In the garden, 

around [there set, 

A table with fruits, Avine, tea, ices, 
Half a dozen yomig men and young 

women were met. 
Light, laughter, and voices, and 

music, all streamed 
Through the quiet-leaved limes. At 

the M'indow there seemed 
For one moment the outline, familiar 

and fair. 
Of a white dress, a white neck, and 

soft dusky hair, 
Which Lord Alfred remembered . . . 

a moment or so 
It hovered, then passed into shadow; 

and slow 
The soft notes, from a tender piano 

upflung, 
Floated forth, and a voice uaforgot- 

ten thus sung: 
•' Hear a song that was born in the 
land of my birth ! 
The anchors "are lifted, the fair 
ship is free. 
And the shout of the mariners 
floats in its mirth 
'Twixt the light in the sky and 
the light ou the sea. 



"And this ship is a world. She is 
freighted with souls. 
She is freighted with merchan- 
dise: proudly she sails 
With the Labor that stores, and 
the Will that controls 
The gold in the ingots, the silk 
in the bales. 

" From the gardens of Pleasure, 
where reddens the rose. 
And the scent of the cedar is 
faint on the air. 
Past the harbors of Traffic, sub- 
limely she goes, 
Man's hopes o'er the world of 
the waters to bear ! 

" Where the cheer from the harbors 
of Traffic is heard. 
Where the gardens of Pleasure 
fade fast on the sight. 
O'er the rose, o'er the cedar, there 
passes a bird ; 
'Tis the Paradise Bird, never 
known to alight. 

" And that bird, bright and bold as a 
Poet's desire. 
Roams her own native heavens, 
the realms of her birth. 
There she soars like a seraph, she 
shines like a fire, 
And her plumage hath never 
been sidlied by earth. 

" And the mariners greet her ; there's 
song on each lip. 
For that bird of good omen, and 
joy in each eye. 
And the ship and the bird, and the 
bivd and the ship, 
Together go forth over ocean and 
sky. 

"Fast, fast fades the land! far the 
rose-gardens flee. 
And far fleet the harbors. In 
regions unknown 
The ship is alone ou a desert of 
sea. 
And the bird in a desert of sky 
Is alone. 



*' In those regions imloiown, o'er 
that desert of air, 
Down that desert of waters — tre- 
mendous in wratli — 
The storm-wind Euroclydon leaps 
from liis lair, 
And cleaves, through the waves 
of the ocean, his path. 

"And the bird in the cloud, and the 
ship on the wave. 
Overtaken, are beaten about by 
wild gales : 
And the mariners all rush their 
cargo to save. 
Of the gold in the ingots, the 
silk in the bales. 

" Lo ! a wonder, which never before 
hath been heard. 
For it never before hath been 
given to sight; 
On the ship hath descended the 
Paradise Bird, 
The Paradise- Bird, never known 
to alight ! 

"The bird which the mariners bless- 
ed, when each lip 
Had a song for the omen that 
gladdened each eye; 
The bright bird for shelter hath 
flown to the ship 
From the wrath on the sea and 
the ^\'ratll in the sky. 

" But the mariners heed not the bird 
any more. 
They are felling the masts, — they 
are cutting the sails ; 
Some are working, some weeping, 
and some wrangling o'er 
Their gold in the ingots, their 
silic in the bales. 

•' Souls of men are on board ; wealth 
of man in the hold ; 
And the storm -wind Euroclydon 
sweeps to his prey; 
And who heeds the bird ? ' Save 
the silk and the gold! ' 
And the bird from her shelter 
the gust sweeps away ! 



" Poor Paradise Bird! on her lone 
flight once more 
Back again in the wake of the 
wind she is driven, — 
To be 'whelmed in the storm, or 
above it to soar, 
And, if rescued from ocean, to 
vanish in heaven ! 

" And the ship rides the waters, and 
weathers the gales : 
From the haven she nears the 
rejoicing is heard. 
All hands are at work on the ingots, 
the bales. 
Save a child, sitting lonely, who 
misses — the Bird ! " 



CANTO III. 



With stout iron shoes be my Pega- 
sus shod ! 
For my road is a roTigh one : flint, 

stubble, and clod. 
Blue clay, and black quagmire, 

brambles no few. 
And 1 gallop up-hill, now. 

There's terror that's true 
In that tale of a youth who, one night 

at a revel, 
Amidst music and mirth lured and 

wiled by some devil. 
Followed ever one mask through the 

mad masquerade, 
Till, pursued to some chamber de- 
serted ('tis said), 
He unmasked, with a kiss, the 

strange lady, and stood 
Face to face with a Thing not of 

flesh nor of blood. 
In this Masque of the Passions, 

called Life, there 's no human 
Emotion, though masked, or in man 

or in woman, 
But, when faced and unmasked, it 

will leave us at last 
Struck by some supernatural aspect 

aghast. 



LUCILE. 



31 



For truth is appalling and eldrich, 

as seen 
By this world's artificial lami:)lights, 

and we screen 
From our sight the strange vision 

that troubles our life. 
Alas ! why is Genius forever at 

strife 
With the world, which, despite the 

world's self, it ennobles ? 
Why is it that Genius perplexes and 

troubles 
And offends the effete life it conies 

to renew ? 
'Tis the terror of truth ! 'tis that 

Genius is true ! 
II. 

Lucile de Nevers (if her riddle I 

read) 
Was a woman of genius : whose gen- 
ius, indeed, 
With her life was at war. Once, 

but once, in that life 
The chance had been hers to escape 

from this strife 
In herself ; finding i)eace in the life 

of another 
From the passionate wants she, in 

hers, failed to smother. 
But the chance fell too soon, when 

the crude restless power 
Which had been to her nature so 

fatal a dower, 
Only wearied the man it yet haunted 

and thralled ; 
And that moment, once lost, had 

been never recalled. 
Yet it left her heart sore : and, to 

shelter her heart 
From approach, she then sought, in 

that delicate art 
Of concealment, those thousand 

adroit strategies 
Of feminine wit, which repel while 

they please, 
A weapon, at once, and a shield, to 

conceal 
And defend all that women can ear- 
nestly feel. 
Thus, striving her instincts to hide 

and repress, 



She felt frightened, at times, by her 

very success : 
She pined for the hill-tops, the 

clouds, and the stars : 
Golden wires may annoy us as much 

as steel bars 
If they keep us behind prison-win- 
dows : impassioned 
Her heart rose and burst the light 

cage slie had fashioned 
Out of glittering trifles around it. 

UnknoM'u 
To herself, all her instincts, without 

liesitation, [tion. 

Embraced the idea of self-immola- 
The strong spirit in her, had her life 

been but blended 
With some man's whose heart had 

her own comprehended, 
All its v.eaUh at his feet would have 

lavishly thrown. 
For him she had struggled and 

striven alone ; 
For him had aspired ; in him had 

transfused 
All the gladness and grace of her 

nature : and used 
For him only the spells of its delicate 

power : 
Like the ministering fairy that 

brings from her bower 
To some mage all the treasures, 

whose use the fond elf, 
More enriched by her love, disre- 
gards for herself. 
But, standing apart, as she ever had 

done. 
And her genius, which needed a 

vent, finding none 
In the broad fields of action thrown 

wide to man's power. 
She unconsciously made it her bul- 
wark and tower. 
And built in it her refuge, whence 

lightly she hurled 
Her contempt at the fashions and ■ 

forms of the world. 

And the permanent cause why she 

now missed and failed 
That firm hold upon life she so 

keenly assailed, 



32 



LUCILE. 



Was, in all those diurnal occasions 

that place 
Say — the world and the woman o])- 

posed face to face, 
Where the woman must yield, she, 

refusing to stir, 
Offended the world, which in tiu'n 

W()und(;d her. 
As before, in the old-fashioned man- 
ner, I fit 
To this character, also, its moral : to 

wit, 
Say — the world is a nettle; disturb 

it, it stings : 
Grasp it firmly, it stfngs not. On one 

of two things. 
If you would not be stung, it be- 
hooves you to settle : 
Avoid it, or crush it. She crushed 

not the riettle ; 
For she could not ; nor would she 

avoid it : she tried 
With the weak hand of woman to 

thrust it aside. 
And it stung her. A woman is too 

slight a thing 
To trample the world without feel- 
ing its sting. 
III. 
One lodges but simply at Serchon ; 

yet, thanks 
To the season that changes forever 

the banks 
Of the blossoming mountains, and 

shifts the light cloud 
O'er the valley, and hushes or rouses 

the loud 
Wind that wails in the pines, or 

creeps murnuiring down 
The daik evergreen slopes to the 

slumbering town, 
And the torrent that falls, faintly 

heard Irom afar, 
And the bluebells that purple tlie 

dapple-gray scaur. 
One sees with each month of the 

many-faced year 
A thousand sweet changes of beauty 

appear. 
The chidet where dwelt the Com- 

tesse de Nevers 



Rested half up the base of a moun- 
tain of firs, 
In a garden of roses, reveaied to the 

road. 
Yet withdrawn from its noise: 'twas 

a peaceful abode. 
And the walls, and the roofs, with 

their gables like hoods 
Which the monks wear, were built 

of sweet resinous woods. 
The sunlight of noon, as Lord Alfred 

ascended 
The steep garden paths, every odor 

had blended 
Of the ardent carnations, and faint 

heliotropes, 
With tlie balms floated down from 

the dark wooded slopes : 
A light breeze at the windows was 

playing about. 
And the white curtains floated, now 

in and now cut. 
The house was all hushed when h ; 

rang at the door. 
Which was opened to him in a mo- 
ment, or nrore, 
By an old nodding negress, whose 

sable head sinned 
In the sun like a cocoa-nut polished 

in Ind, 
'Neath the snowy foulard which 

about it Avas Avomul. 

IV, 
Lord Alfred sprang forward at once, 

with a bound. 
He remembeied the nurse of Lucile. 

The old dame, 
Whose teeth and whose eyes used to 

beam when he came, 
With a boy's eager step, in the blithe 

days of yore, 
To pass, unannounced, her young 

mistress's door. 
The old woman had fondled Lucile 

on her knee 
When she left, as an infant, far over 

the sea, 
In India, the tomb of a mother, un- 
known. 
To pine, a pale floweret, in great 

Paris town. 



J- 



LUCILE. 



33 



)lie Imd soothed the child's sobs on 
her breast, when she read 

Che letter that -told her her father 
was dead. 

\vl astute, shrewd adventurer, who, 
like Ulysses, 

I;ul studied men, cities, laws, wars, 
the abysses 

)f statecraft, with varying fortunes, 
was he. 

rlehad wandered the world through, 
by laud and by sea, 

Vnd knew it in most of its pliases. 
Strong will, 

subtle tact, and soft nuiuners, had 
given him skill 

Po conciliate Fortune, and courage 
to brave 

ler displeasure. Thrice sliiijwreck- 
ed, and cast by the Avave 

)n his own quick resources, they 
rarely had failed 

ilis command : often baffled, he 
ever prevailed, 

ji his combat with fate : to-day 
flattered and fed 

Jy monarchs, to-morrow in search 
of mere bread. 

Che offspring of times trouble- 
haunted, he came 

Df a family ruined, yet noble in 
name. 

3e lost sight of his fortune at twen- 
ty in France ; 

\nd, half statesman, half soldier, 
and wholly Free-lance, 

3ad wandered in search of it, over 
the world, 

;nto India. 

But scarce had the nomad un- 
furled 

[lis wandering tent at Mysore, in 
the smile 

3f a Kajah (whose court he con- 
trolled for awhile, 

^nd whose council he prompted and 
governed by stealth); 

scarce, indeed, had he M'edded an 
Indian (jf wealth, 

IVho died giving birth to this daugh- 
ter, before 



He was borne to the tomb of his wife 
at Mysore. 

His fortune, whicli fell to his or- 
phan, perchance. 

Had secured her a liome with his 
sister in France, 

A lone woman, the last of W race 
left. Lucile 

Neither felt, nor affected, the wish 
to conceal 

The half-Eastern blood, which ap- 
peared to bequeath 

(Revealed now and then, though but 
rarely, beneath 

That outward repose that concealed 
it in her) 

A something half wild to her strange 
claracter. 

The muse with the orphan, awhile 
broken-hearted. 

At the door of a convent in Paris 
had parted. 

But later, once more, Avith her mis- 
tress she tarried, 

When the girl, by that grim maiden 
aunt, had been married 

To a dreary old Count, who had sul- 
lenly died. 

With no claim on her tears, — she 
had wept as a bride. 

Said Lord Alfred, " Your mistress 
expects me." 

The crone 

Oped the drawing-room door, and 
there left him alone. 



O'er the soft atmosphere of this 
temple of grace 

Rested silence and perfume. No 
sound reached the place. 

In the white curtains wavered the 
delicate shade 

Of the heaving acacias, through 
which the breeze played. 

O'er the smooth wooden floor, pol- 
ished dark as a glass. 

Fragrant white India matting allow- 
ed you to pass. 



34 



LUCILE. 



In light olive baskets, by window 
and door, 

Some hung from the ceiling, some 
crowding the floor. 

Rich wild-tlowers plucked by Lucile 
from the hill, 

Seemed the room with their passion- 
ate presence to till : 

Blue aconite, hid in white roses, re- 
posed ; 

The deep belladonna its vermeil dis- 
closed ; 

And the frail saponaire, and tlie 
tender bluebell, 

And the piu'ple valerian, — each child 
of the fell 

And the solitude flourished, fed fair 
from the source 

Of waters the lumtsman scarce heeds 
in Ills course. 

Where the chamois and izard, with 
delicate hoof, 

Pause or tiit through the pinnacled 
silence aloof. 



Here you felt by the sense of its 

beauty reposed. 
That you stood in a shrine of sweet 

tlioughts. Half unclosed 
In the ligiit slept the Howers : all 

was pure and at rest ; 
All peaceful; all modest; all seemed 

self-possessed, 
And aware of the silence. Xo ves- 
tige or trace 
-Of a young woman's coquetry trou- 
bled the place. 
He stood by the window. A cloud 

liassed tlie sun. 
A light breeze uplifted the leaves, 

one by one. 
Just then Lucile entered the room, 

Undisccrned 
By Lord Alfred, whose face to the 

window was turned. 
In a strange revery. 

The time was, when Lucile, 
In beh( iiling that man, could not 

help but reveal 



The i-aptiue,the fear which wrenclied 
out every nerve 

In the lieart of the girl from the wo- 
man's reserve. 

And now — she gazed at him, calm, 
smiling, — perchance 

Indifferent. 

VII. 

Indifferently turning his glance, 

Alfred Vargrave encountered thai 
gaze unaM-are. 

O'er a bodice snow-wliite streamed 
her soft dusky hair ; 

A rose-bud half blown in her liand ; 
in her eyes 

A half-pensive smile. 

A sliarp cry of surprise 

Escaped from Ids lips : some un- 
known agitation. 

An invincible trouble, a strange pal- 
pitation. 

Confused his ingenious and frivolous 
wit ; 

Overtook, and entangled, and para- 
lyzed it. 

That wit so complacent and docile, 
that ever 

Lightly came at the call of the light- 
est endeavor, 

lieady coined, and availably current 
as gold, 

Which, secure of its value, so flu- 
ently rolled 

In free circulation from hand on to 
hand 

For the usage of all, at a moment's 
connnand ; 

For once it rebelled, it was mute 
and unstirred. 

And he looked at Lucile without 
speaking a word. 



Perhaps what so troubled him was, 

tliat the face 
On Mhose feattu'es he gazed had no 

more than a trace 
Of tlie face his remendjrance had 

imaged for years. 
Yes ! the face he remembered M^as 

faded Mith tears : 



LUCILE. 



35 



Grief had famished the figure, and 
dimined the dark eyes, 

And starved the pale lips, too ac- 
quainted with siglis. 

And that tender, and gracious, and 
fond coqiietterie 

Of a woman who knows her least 
ribbon to be 

Something dear to the lips that so 
warmly caress 

Every sacred detail of her exquisite 
dress. 

In the careless loilet of Lucile, — 
then too sad 

To care aught to her changeable 
beauty to add, — 

Lord Alfred had never admired be- 
fore I 

Alas ! poor Lucile, in those weali 
days of yore. 

Had neglected hei'self, never heed- 
ing, nor thinking 

(While the blossom and bloom of her 
beauty were shrinking) 

That sorrow can beautify only the 
heart — 

Not the face — of a woman ; and can 
but impart 

Its endearment to one that has suf- 
fered. In truth , 

Grief hath beauty for grief ; but gay 
youth loves gay youth. 



Tlie woman that now met, unshrink- 
ing, his gaze, 

Seemed to bask in the silent but 
sumptuous haze 

Of that soft second sunnuer, more 
ripe than the first. 

Which returns -when tlie bud to the 
blossom hath burst 

In despite of the stormiest April. 
lAicile 

Had acquired that matchless uncon- 
scious appeal 

To the homage which none but a 
chiu'l would withhold — 

That caressing and v.. ■ usite grace — 
never bold, 



Ever present — which just a few wo- 
men possess. 

From a healthful repose, undisturbed 
by the stress 

Of unquiet emotions, her soft cheek 
had drawn 

A freshness as pure as the twilight 
of dawn. 

Her figure, though slight, had re- 
vived everywhere 

The luxurious proportions of youth ; 
and her hair — 

Once shorn as an offering to pas- 
sionate love — 

Now floated or rested redundant 
above 

Her airy pure forhead and throat ; 
gathered loose 

Under which, by one violet knot, the 
profuse 

Milk-white folds of a cool modest 
garment reposed, 

Kippled faint by the breast iliey half 
hid, half disclosed, 

And her simple attire thus in all 
things revealed 

The fine art which so artfully all 
things concealed. 



Lord Alfred, who never conceived 

that Lucile 
Could have looked so enchanting, 

felt tempted to kneel 
At her feet, and her pardon with 

passion implore ; 
But the calm smile that met him 

suificed to restore 
The pride and the bitterness needed 

to meet 
The occasion with dignity due and 

discreet. 

XI. 

" Madam," — thus he began with a 
voice reassured, — 

" You see that your latest command 
has secured 

My immediate obedience, — presum- 
ing I may 

Consider my freedom restored from 
this day." — 



3(5 



LUCILE. 



•' 1 had thought," said Lucile, with 

a smile gay yet sad, 
" That your freedom from me not a 

fetter has had. 
Indeed ! ... in my chains have yon 

rested till now ? 
I had not so flattered myself, I 

avow ! " 
" For Heaven's sake, Madam," Lord 

Alfred replied, 
"Do not jest ! has the moment no 

sadness ?" he sighed. 
" 'Tis an ancient tradition," she an- 
swered. " a tale 
Often told. — a position too sure to 

prevail 
In the end of all legends of love. If 

we wrote. 
When we first love, foreseeing that 

houi' yet remote. 
Wherein of necessity each would re- 
call 
From the other the poor foolish 

records of all 
Those emotions, whose pain, when 

record(Ml. s^H^med bliss, 
Should we write as we wrote ? But 

one tliinks not of this ! 
At Twenty ( who does not atTwenty ?) 

we write 
Believing eternal the frail vows we 

plight ; 
And we smile with a confident pity, 

above 
The vulgar results of all poor human 

love : 
For we deem, with that vanity com- 
mon to youth. 
Because M-hat we feel in our bosoms, 

in truth. 
Is novel to lis — that 'tis novel to 

earth. 
And will prove the exception, in 

durance and worth. 
To the great law to which all on 

earth must incline. 
The error was noble, the vanity fine ! 
Shall we blame it because we sur- 
vive it ? ah, no ; 
'Twas the youth of our youth, my 

lord, is it not so ? " 



Lord Alfred was mute. He remem- 
bered her yet 

A child, — the weak sport of each 
moment's regret, 

Blindly yielding herself to the errors 
of life. 

The deceptions of youth, and borne 
down by the strife 

And the tumult of passion; the trem- 
ulous toy 

Of each transient emotion of grief or 
of joy. 

But to watch her pronomice the 
death-warrant of all 

The illusions of life, — lift, unflincli- 
ing, the pall 

From the bier of the dead Past, — 
that woman so fair, 

And so yoimg, yet her own self-sur- 
vivor: who there 

Traced her life's epitaph with a finger 
so cold ! 

'Twas a picture that pained his self- 
love to behold. 

He himself knew — none better — the 
things to be said 

Upon subjects like tliis. Yet he 
bowed down his head : 

Ami as thus, with a trouble he could 
not command. 

He paused, crumpling the letters he 
held in his hand, 

"You know me enough," she con- 
tinued, "or whali 

I would say is, you yet recollect (do 
you not, [to know 

Lord Alfred ?) enough of my nature, 

That these pledges of what was per- 
haps long ago 

A foolish affection, I do not recall 

From those UiOtives of prudence 
which actuate all 

Or most women when their love 
ceases. Indeed, 

If you have such a doubt, to dispel it 
I need 

But remind you that ten years these 
letters have rested 

Unreclaimed in your hands." A re- 
proach seemed suggested 



LUCILE. 



37 



By these words. To meet it, Lord 

Alfred looked up. 
(His gaze had beeu fixed on a blue 

Sevres cup 
With a look of profoimd connoisseur- 
ship, — a smile 
Oi singular interest and care, all this 

while.) 
He loo'vcd up, and looked long in the 

face of Lucile, 
To mark if that face by a sign would 

reveal 
At the thought of Miss Darcy the 

least jealous pain. 
He looked keenly and long, yet he 

looked there in vain. 
"You are generous, Madam," lie 

miu'mured at last. 
And into his voice a light irony 

passed. 
He had looked for reproaches, and 

fully arranged 
His forces. But straightway the 

enemy changed 
The position. 

xiri. 
''Come!" gayly Lucile interposed. 
With a smile whose divinely deep 

sweetness disclosed 
Some depth in her nature he never 

had known, 
While she tenderly laid her light 

hand on his own, 
"Do not think I abuse the occasion. 

We gain 
Justice, judgment, with years, or 

else years are in vain. 
From me not a single reproach can 

you hear. 
I have sinned to myself, — to the 

world, — nay, I fear 
To you chiefly. The woman who 

loves should, indeed, 
Be the friend of the man that she 

loves. She should heed 
Not her selfish and often mistaken 

desires. 
But his interest whose fate her own 

interest inspires; 
And, rather than seek to allure, for 

her sake, 



His life down the turbulent, fanciful 
wake [art 

Of impossible destinies, use all her 

That his place in the world find its 
place in her lieart. 

I, alas! — I perceived not this truth 
till too late; 

I tormented your youth, I have dark- 
ened your fate. 

Forgive me the ill I have done for 
the sake 

Of its long expiation!" 

XIV. 

Lord Alfred, awake. 

Seemed to wander from dream on to 
dream. In that seat 

Where he sat as a criminal, ready to 
meet 

His accuser, he found himself turned 
by some change, 

As surprising and all miexpected as 
strange. 

To the judge from whose mercy in- 
dulgence was sought. 

All the world's foolish pride in that 
moment was naught; 

He felt all his plausible theories 
posed; 

And, thrilled by the beauty of nature 
disclosed 

In the pathos of all he had witnessed, 
his head 

He bowed, and faint words self-re- 
proaclifully said. 

As he lifted her hand to his lips. 
'Tvvas a hand 

White, delicate, dimpled, warm, lan- 
guid, and bland. 

The hand of a woman is often, in 
youth. 

Somewhat rough, somewhat red, 
somewhat graceless, in truth; 

Does its beauty refine, as its pulses 
grow calm. 

Or as Sorrow has crossed the life- 
line in the palm ? 

XV. 

The more that he looked, that he 

listened, the more 
He discovered perfections unnoticed 

before. 



38 



LUCILE. 



Less salient than once, less poetic, 

perchance. 
This woman who thus had survived 

the romance 
That had made him its hero, and 

breathed him its sighs, 
Seemed more charming a thousand 

times o'er to his eyes. 
Together tliey talked of the years 

since when last 
They parted, contrasting the present, 

the past. 
Yet no memory marred their light 

converse. Lucile 
Questioned much, with the interest 

a sister might feel, 
Of Lord Alfred" snew life, — of Miss 

Darcy, — her face. 
Her temper, accomplishments, — 

pausing to trace 
The advantage derived from a hymen 

so fit. 
Of herself, she recounted with humor 

and wit 
Her journeys, her daily employ- 
ments, the lands 
She had seen, and the books she had 

read, and the hands 
She had shaken. 

In all that she said there appeared 
An amiable irony. Laughing, she 

reared 
The temple of reason, with ever a 

touch 
Of light scorn at her work, revealed 

only so much 
As there gleams, in the thyrsus that 

Bacchanals bear, 
Througli the blooms of a garland the 

point of a spear. 
But above, and beneath, and beyond 

all of this. 
To that soul, whose experience had 

jiaralyzed bliss, 
A benignant indulgence, to all things 

resigned, [mind, 

A justice, a sweetness, a meekness of 
Gave a luminous beauty, as tender 

and faint 
And serene as the halo encircling a 

saint. 



Unobserved by Lord Alfred the time 

fleeted by. 
To each novel sensation spontane- 
ously 
He abandoned himself with that 

ardor so strange 
Which belongs to a mind grown ac- 
customed to change. 
He .sought, with well-practised and 

delicate art, 
To surprise from Lucile the true state 

of her heart; 
But his efforts were Aain, and the 

woman, as ever, 
More adroit than the man, baffled 

every endeavor. 
When he deemed he had touched on 

some chord in her being, 
At the touch it dissolved, and was 

gone. Ever fleeing 
As ever he near it advanced, when he 

thought 
To have seized, and proceeded to 

analyze aught 
Of the moral existence, the absolute 

soul. 
Light as vapor the phantom escaped 

his control. 



From the hall, on a sudden, a sharp 
ring was heard. 

In the passage without a quick foot- 
step there stirred. 

At the door knocked the negress, 
and thrust in her head, 

'' The Duke de Luvois had just en- 
tered," she said, 

"And insisted "' — 
" Tlie Duke ! " cried Lucile (as 
she spoke 

The Duke's step, approaching, a 
light echo woke). 

" Say I do not receive till the even- 
ing. Explain," 

As she glanced at Lord Alfred, she 
added again, 

" I have business of private impor- 
tance." 



I 

4 



LUCILE. 



39 



Thom oaiuti Its iufpssrtiit siiiiill voices like stiii'is 



O'er Lonl Airrcil ;it oiico, at tlio 

sound of tliiit iiaiiu', 
An inviMfil)l(' sense of vexation. lie 

turned 
'J\) Lucile, and lie I'aneieil lie iiiintly 

discerned 
On lier luci" an indelinite look of 

eonliision. 
On his mind instantaneously Mashed 

the eonelnsion. 
That his presenee had cause it. 



seenietl to sound 

On his sore an,t;ry sense. He stood 
,i,'rievin,i; the hot 

Solid sun with his shadow, nor stir- 
red from the spot. 

The last look of l.iicile slill hewilder- 
ed, iier'plcxed. 

Ami reproaclied him. 'i'he Duke's 
visit f,'oaded and vexed. 

He had not yet j;iven I he letters. 
Again 



He said, wilhasnftor He must visit laicilc. He resolved 
Which he could not repress, " Let to remain 



not \)iv interi'ei'e 
With the claims on your time, lady ! 

when you ari^ free 
From more pleasant engagements, 

allow me to see 
And to wait on you lat<'r." 



Where he was till the Duke went. 

In short, he would stay. 
Wore it only to know when the Duke 

went away. 
But just as he formed this resolve, 

he jicrceived 



The words wtrre not .said Aitproaching towards him, hetweeii 



Eri^ ho wished to recall them. He 

hitteily read 
The mistake he had niade in Lucilc's 

(lashint; cy<'. 
Inclining her head, as in haugliiy 

reply, 
More reproachful perchance than all 

utter(!d rchuke, 
She said merely, resuming her seat, 

"Tell tlie Duke 
lie may enter." 



the Ihick-icaved 
And luxuriant laurels, laicile and 

the Duke. 
Thus surprised, his (irst thought was 

to seek I'oi- some nook 
WluMici! he niighl, uiioliser\t'<l, from 

th<' garden retreat. 
They had not yet seen him. 'I'he 

.Sound of th(dr feet 
And Iheir voices had warned him in 

time. They were walking 



And vexed with his own words Towards him. 'I'he Duke (a true 



•and liei's, 



Ficnchnian) was talkin 



Alfred VarL'rave. l)owed low to Lueilc i With tlui actiiju of Talma. He saw 



de Nevers, 



at a glance 



Pa.ssed the casement and entered the I That tliey barred tln^ sole i)atli to the 



garden. Hefore 



gateway. No chancc! 



His shadow was (led the Duke stood ' Of escape .savo. in instant c(mceal- 



at the do(tr. 

.will. 
WluiU left t(j his thought,s in the 

garden alone, 
Alfnid Vargrave stood, strange to 

himself. With iliill t(nu> 
Of imp'ortancc!, through cities of rose 

and carnation, 
Went the lice on his business from 

station to station. 
The miiiiUi; mirth of summer was 

»luiil all around ; 



ment ! Deei)-dipped 

In lliick Idliage, an arbor stood near. 
In he sli|ii;ed, 

Saved from siglit as in front of ib.it 
ambush they passed. 

Still conversing. Heneath a labur- 
num at last 

They paused, and sat dov n on a 
liench in the shade. 

So close that he could not but hear 
what they said. 



40 



LUCILE. 



XIX. 

LUCILE. 

Duke, I scarcely conceive . . . 
Luvois. 
Ah, forgive ! . . . I desired 
So deeply to see you to-day. You 

retired 
So early last night from the ball . . . 

this whole week 
I have seen you pale, silent, ijreoc- 

cuijied . . . speak, 
Speak, Lucile, and forgive me ! . . . 

I know that I am 
A rash fool — but I love you ! I love 

you, Madame, 
More than language can say ! Do 

not deem, O Lucile, 
That the love I no longer have 

strength to conceal 
Is a passing caprice ! It is strange 

to my jiature, 
It has made me, unknown to myself, 

a new creature. 
I implore you to sanction and save 

the new life 
Wliich I lay at your feet with this 

prayer — Be my wife ; 
Stoop, and raise me ! 

Lord Alfred could scarcely restrain 
The sudden, acute pang of anger and 

pain 
With which he had heard this. As 

though to some wind 
The leaves of the hushed windless 

laurels behind 
The two thus in converse w^ere sud- 
denly stirred. 
The soiuid half betrayed him. They 

started. He heard 
The low voice of Lucile ; but so 

faint was its tone 
That her answer escaped him. 

Luvois hurried on. 
As though in remonstrance with 

what had been spoken. 
" Nay, I know it, Lucile ! but your 

heart was not broken 
By the trial in which all its fibres 

were proved. 



Love, perchance, you mistrust, yet 

you need to be loved. 
You mistake your own feelings. I 

fear you mistake 
What so ill I interpret, those feelings 

which make 
Words like these vague and feeble. 

Whatever your heart 
May have suffered of yore, this can 

only impart 
A pity profound to the love which I 

feel. 
Hush ! hush ! I know all. Tell me 

nothing, Lucile." 
" You know all, Duke ? " she said ; 
'■ M'ell then, know that, in truth, 
I have learned from the rude lesson 

taught to my youth 
From my own heart to shelter my 

life ; to mistrust 
The heart of another. We are what 

we must, 
And not what we would be. I know 

that one hour 
Assm'es not another. The will and 

the power 
Are diverse." 

" O madam ! " he answered, " you 

fence 
With a feeling you know to be ti'ue 

and intense. 
'Tis not my life, Lucile, that I plead 

for alone : 
If your nature I know, 'tis no less 

for your own. 
That nature will prey on itself ; it 

was made 
To influence others. Consider," he 

saiil , 
" That genius craves power, — what 

scope for it here ? 
Gifts less noble to me give command 

of that sphere 
In which' genius ?.s power. Such 

gifts you despise ? 
But you do not disdain what such 

gifts realize ! 
I offer you, Lady, a name not un- 
known — 
A fortune which worthless, without 

you, is grown — 



LUCILE. 



41 



All my life at your feet I lay down — 

at youi- feet 
A. lieart which for you, and you 

only, can beat." 

LUCILE. 

That heart, Duke, that life — I re- 
s^Dect both. Tlie name 

And position you offer, and all that 
you claim 

In behalf of their nobler employ- 
ment, I feel 

To deserve what, in turn, I now ask 
you — 

Luvois. 
Lucile ! 

LUCILK. 

I ask you to leave me — 
Luvois. 

You do not reject ? 
Lucile. 
I ask you to leave me the time to re- 
flect. 

Luvois. 
You ask me ? — 

Lucile. 

— The time to reflect. 
Luvois. 

Say — One word ! 
May I hope ? 

Tlie reply of Lucile was not heard 
By Lord Alfred; for just then she 

rose, and moved on. 
The Duke bowed his lips o'er her 
hand, and was eone. 



Not a sound save the birds in the 
bushes. And when 

Alfred Vargrave reeled forth to the 
simlight again. 

He just saw the white robe of the 
woman recede 

As she entered the house. 

Scarcely conscious indeed 

Of his steps, he too followed, and en- 
tered. 



He entered 
Unnoticed; Lucile never stirred: so 

concentred 
And wholly absorbed in her thouglits 

she appeared. 
Her back to the window was turned. 

- As he neared 
The sofa, her face from the glass was 

rellected. 
Her dark eyes were fixed on the 

ground. Pale, dejected. 
And lost in profound meditation she 

seemed. 
Sof'tly, silently, over her drooped 

shoulders streamed 
The afternoon sunlight. The cry of 

alarm 
And surprise which escaped her, as 

now on her arm 
Alfred Vargrave let fall a hand icily 

cold [told 

And clannny as death, all too cruelly 
How far he had been from her 

thoughts. 

XXII. 

All his cheek 
Was disturbed with the effort it cost 

him to speak. 
" It was not my fault. I have heard 

all," he said. 
"N"ow the letters — and farewell, 

Lucile ! When you wed 
May-" 
The sentence broke short, like a 

weapon that snaps 
When the weight of a man is upon 

it. 

"Perhaps," 
Said Lucile (her sole answer revealed 

in the flush 
Of quick color which up to her brows 

seemed to rush 
In reply to those few broken words), 

"this farewell 
Is our last, Alfred Vargrave, in life. 

Who can tell ? 
Let us part witliout bitterness. IJero 

are your letters. 
Be assured I retain you no more jji 

my fetters ! "—r ' 



42 



LVCILE, 



She laughed, as she said this, a little 
.sad laugh. 

And stretched out her hand with the 
letters. And half 

Wroth to feel his wrath rise, and 
unahle to trust 

His own powers of restraint, in his 
bosom he thrust 

The packet she gave, with a short 
angry sigh. 

Bowed his head, and departed with- 
out a reply. 

XXIII. 

And Lucile was alone. And the men 

of the world 
Were gone back to the world. And 

the world's self was furled 
Far away frdin the heart of the 

woman. Her hand 
Drooped, and from it, unloosed from 

their frail silken band. 
Fell those early love-lettei-s, strewn, 

scattered, and shed 
At her feet — life's lost blossoms! 

Dejected, her head 
On her bosom was bowed. Her gaze 

vaguely strayed o'er 
Those strewn records of passionate 

moments no more. 
From each page to her sight leapt 

some word that belied 
The composure Avith which she that 

day had denied 
Every claim on her heart to those 

poor |)crisbed yeai'S. 
They avenged themselves now, and 

she burst into tears. 



CANTO IV. 



Letter from Cousin John to Cousin 
Alkued. 

" BiGORRE, Thursday. 
" Time up, you rascal ! Come back, 

or be hanged. 
Matilda grows peevish. Her mother 

harangued 



For a whole hour this morning about 
you. The deuce! 

What on earth can I say to you ? — 
Nothing's of use. 

And the blame of the whole of your 
shocking behavior 

Falls on me, sir! Come back, — do 
you hear ? — or I leave your 

Affairs, and abjure you forever. 
Come back 

To your anxious betrothed; and per- 
plexed 

*' Cousin Jack." 



Alfred needed, in truth, no entreaties 

from John 
To increase his impatience to fly 

from Serchon. 
All the place was now fraught with 

sensations of ])ain 
Which, whilst iji it, lie strove to es- 
cape from in vain. 
A wild instinct warned him to fly 

from a place 
Where he felt that some fatal event, 

SAvift of pace. 
Was a]iproachiitg his life. In despite 

his endeavor 
To think of Matilda, her image for- 
ever 
Was effaced from his fancy by that of 

Lucile. 
From the ground which he stood on 

lie felt himself reel. 
Scared, alarmed by those feelings to 

which, on the day 
Just before, all his heart had so soon 

given way. 
When Tie caught, with a strange sense 

of feai', for assistance. 
At what was, till then, the great fact 

in existence, 
'Twas a phantom he grasped. 



Having sent for his guide. 
He ordered his horse, and delermiuec 

to ride 
Back forthwith to Bisorre. 



LUCILE. 



43 



Then, the guide, who well knew 

Every haunt of those hills, said the 
wild lake of Oo 

Lay a league from Serchon; and sug- 
gested a track 

By the lake to Bigorre, which, trans- 
versing the back 

Of the luounlain, avoided a circuit 
between 

Two long vallej'S ; and thinking, 
" Perchance change of scene 

May create cliange of thought," Al- 
fred Vargrave agreed, 

Mounted horse, and set forth to Bi- 
gorre at full speed. 



His guide rode beside him. 

The king of the guides ! 
The gallant Bernard ! ever boldly he 

rides. 
Ever gayly he sings! For to him, 

from of old. 
The hills have confided their secrets, 

and told 
■\Vliere the white partridge lies, and 

the cock o' the woods ; • 
Wliere the izard flits fine.through the 

cold solitudes ; 
Where the bear lurks perdu; and the 

lynx on his prey 
At nightfall descends, when the 

mountains are gray; 
Wliere the sassafras blooms, and the 

bluebell is born. 
And the wild rhododendron first 

reddens at morn ; 
Where the source of the waters is 

fine as a thread ; 
How the storm on the wild Mala- 

detta is spread ; 
Where the thiuider is hoarded, the 

snows lie asleep, 
Whence the torrents are fed, and the 

cataracts leap ; 
And, familiarly known in the ham- 
lets, the vales 
Have whispered to him all their 

thousand love-tales ; 
He has laughed with the girls, he 

has leaped Avith the boys ; 



Ever blithe, ever bold, ever boon, he 
enjoys 

An existence untroubled by envy or 
strife, 

While he feeds on the dews and the 
juices of life. 

And so lightly he sings, and so gay- 
ly he rides. 

For Bekn ARD LE Sauteue is the 
king of all guides ! 
V. 

But Bernard foimd, that day, neither 
song nor love-tale, 

Nor adventure, nor laughter, nor 
legend avail 

To arouse from his deep and pro- 
found reverie 

Him that silent beside him rode fast 
as could be. 
VI. 

Ascending the mountain they slack- 
ened their pace, 

And the marvellous prospect each 
moment changed face. 

The breezy and pure inspirations of 
morn 

Breathed about them. The scarped 
ravaged mountains, all woni 

By the torrents, wliose coiirse tliey 
watched faintly meander. 

Were alive with the diamonded shy 
salamander. 

They paused o'er the bosom of pur- 
ple abysses. 

Aud Avound through a region of 
green wildernesses ; 

The waters went wirbling above and 
around. 

The forests hung heaped in their 
shadows profound. 

Here the Larboust, and there Aven- 
tin, Castellou, 

Which the Demon, of Tempest, de- 
scending upon. 

Had wasted with fire, and the i^eace- 
ful Cazeaux 

They marked ; and far down in the 
sunshine below, 

Half dipped in a valley of au'iest 
blue, 



The wliite happy homes of the vil- 
lage of Oo, 

Where the age is yet golden. 

And high overhead 

The wrecks of the combat of Titan,? 
were spread. 

Red granite and quartz, in the alche- 
mic smi, 

Fused their splendors of crimson and 
crystal in one ; 

And deep in the moss gleamed the 
delicate shells, 

And the dew lingered fresh in the 
heavy harebells ; 

The large violet burned ; the cam- 
panula blue ; 

And Autumn's own flower, the saf- 
fron, peered through 

The red-berried brambles and thick 
sassafras ; 

And fragrant with thyme was the 
delicate grass ; 

And high up, and higher, and high- 
est of all. 

The secular phantom of snow ! 

O'er the wall 

Of a gray sunless glen gaping drowsy 
below, 

That aerial spectre, revealed in the 
glow 

Of the great golden dawn, hovers 
faint on the eye. 

And appears to grow in, and grow 
out of, the sky, 

And plays with the fancy, and baf- 
fles the sight. 

Only reached by the vast rosy ripple 
of light, 

And the cool star of eve, the Im- 
perial Thing, 

Half unreal, like some mythological 
king 

That dominates all in a fable of old. 

Takes command of a valley as fair 
to behold 

As aught in old fables ; and, seen or 
unseen. 

Dwells aloof over all, in the vast and 
serene 

Sacred sky, where the footsteps of 
spirits are f ui'led 



'Mid the clouds beyond which 
spreads the infinite world 

Of man's last aspirations, unfatliom- 
ed, imtrod, 

Save by Even and Morn, and the 
angels of God. 



Meanwhile, as they journeyed, that 
serpentine road, 

Now abruptly reversed, unexpect- 
edly showed 

A gay cavalcade some few feet in 
advance. 

Alfred Vargrave's heart beat ; for 
he saw at a glance 

The slight form of Lucile in the 
midst. His next look 

Showed him, joyously ambling be- 
side her, the Duke. 

The rest of the troop which had thus 
caught his ken 

He knew not, nor noticed them, 
(women and men). 

They were laughing and talking to- 
gether. Soon after 

His sudden appearance suspended 
their laughter. 

VIII. 

" You here ! . . . I imagined you far 

on yoiu- way 
To Bigorre ! " . . . . said Lucile. 
" Wliat has caused you to stay ? " 
"I am on my way to Bigorre," he 

replied, 
" But, since my way would seem to 

be yours, let me ride 
For one moment beside you." And 

then, with a stoop, 
At her ear, ..." and forgive me ! " 

IX. 

By this time the troop 
Had regathered its numbers. 

Lucile was as pale 
As the cloud 'neath their feet, on its 

way to the vale. 
The Duke had observed it, nor quit- 
ted her side, 
For even one moment, the whole of 
the ride. 



LUCILE. 



45 



Alfred smiled, as he thought, "he 
is jealous of her ! " 

And the thought of this jealousy ad- 
ded a spur 

To his firm resolution and effort to 
please. 

He talked much ; was witty, and 
quite at his ease. 

X. 

After noontide, the clouds, which 
had traversed the east 

Half the day, gathered closer, and 
rose and increased. 

The air changed and chilled. As 
though out of the ground, 

There ran up the trees a confused 
hissing sound. 

And the wind rose. The guides 
sniffed, like chamois, the air, 

And looked at each other, and halt- 
ed, and there 

Unbuckled the cloaks from the sad- 
dles. The white 

Aspens rustled, and turned up their 
frail leaves in fright. 

All announced the approach of the 
tempest. 

Ere long. 

Thick darkness descended the moun- 
tains among ; 

And a vivid, vindictive, and serpen- 
tine flash 

Gored the darkness, and shore it 
across with a gash. 

The rain fell in large heavy drops. 
And anon 

Broke the thunder. 

The horses took fright, every one. 

The Duke's in a moment was far out 
of sight. 

The guides whooped. The hand was 
obliged to alight ; 

And, disi^ersed up the perilous path- 
way, Avalked blind 

To the darkness before from the 
darkness behind. 

XI. 

And the Storm is abroad in the 
mountains ! 

He fills 



The crouched hollows and all the 

oracular hills 
With dread voices of power. A 

roused million or more 
Of wild eclioes reluctantly rise from 

their hoar 
Immemorial ambush, and roll in the 

wake 
Of the cloud, whose reflection leaves 

vivid the lake. 
And the wind, that wild robber, for 

plunder descends 
From invisible lands, o'er those black 

mountain ends; 
He howls as he hounds down his 

prey; and his lash 
Tears the hair of the timorous wan 

mountain-ash, 
That clings to the rocks, M^ith her 

gai'ments all torn. 
Like a Avoman in fear ; then he blows 

his hoarse horn. 
And is otl:, the fierce guide of destruc- 
tion and terror. 
Up the desolate heights, 'mid 

tricate error 
Of mountain and mist. 



There is war in the skies ! 

Lo ! the black-winged legions of tem- 
pest ai'ise 

O'er those sharp splintered rocks 
that are gleaming below 

In the soft light, so fair and so fatal, 
as though 

Some seraph burned through them 
the thunder-bolt searching 

Wliich the black cloud unbosomed 
just now. Lo ! the lurching 

And shivering pine-trees, like phan- 
toms, that seem 

To waver above, in the dark; and 
yon stream. 

How it hurries and roars, on its way 
to the white 

And paralyzed lake there, appalled 
at the sight 

Of the things seen in heaven! 



46 



LUCILE. 



Tliroiigh tlie darkness and awe 
That had gathered around him, Lord 

Alfred now saw, 
Revealed in the fierce and evanishing 

glare 
Of the lightning that momently 

pulsed through the air, 
A woman alone on a shelf of the 

hill, 
With her cheek coldly propped on 

her hand, — and as still 
As the roclc that she sat on, which 

beetled above 
The black lake beneath her. 

All terror, all love, 
Added speed to the instinct with 

which he rushed on. 
For one moment the blue lightning 

swathed the whole stone 
In its lurid embrace: like the sleek 

dazzling snake 
That encircles a sorceress, charmed 

for her sake 
And lulled by her loveliness; fawn- 
ing, it played 
And caressingly "twined romid the 

feet and the head 
Of the woman who sat there, un- 
daunted and calm 
As the soul of that solitude, listing 

the psalm 
Of the plangent and laboring tempest 

roll slow 
From the caldron of midnight and 

vapor below. 
Next moment fi'om bastion to bas- 
tion, all round, 
Of the siege-circled mountains, there 

tumbled the sound 
Of the battering tliunder's indefinite 

peal, 
And Lord Alfred had sprmig to the 

feet of Lucile. 

XIV. 

She started. Once more, with its 

flickering wand. 
The lightning approached her. In 

terror, her hand 



Alfred Vargrave had seized •within 

his ; and he felt 
The light fingers that coldly and lin- 

geringly dwelt 
In the grasp of his own, tremble 

faintly. 

" See! see! 
Where the whirlwind hath stricken 

and strangled yon tree!" 
She exclaimed, . . . "like the pas- 
sion that brings on its breath, 
To the being it embraces, destruction 

and death! 
Alfred Vargrave, the lightning is 

round you!" 

"Lucile! 
I hear — I see — naught but yourself. 

I can feel 
Nothing here but your presence. My 

. pride fights in vain 
With the truth that leaps from me. 

We two meet again 
'Neath yon terrible heaven that is 

watching above 
To avenge if I lie when I swear that 

I love, — 
And beneath yonder terrible heaven, 

at your feet, 
I humble my head and my heart. I 

entreat 
Your pardon, Lucile, for the past, — 

I implore 
For the future your mercy, — implore 

it with more 
Of passion than prayer ever breathed. 

By the power 
Which invisibly touches us both in 

this hour, 
By the rights I have o'er you, Lucile, 

I demand" — 

"The rights!" . . . said Lucile, and 
drew from him her hand. 

"Yes, the rights! for what greater 

to man may belong 
Thau the right to repair in the future 

the wrong 
To the past ? and the wrong I have 

done you, of yore, 
nath bequeathed to me all the sad 

right to restore. 



V\ 



To retrieve, to amcDcI ! I, who in- 
jured your life, 

Urge the right to repair it, Liicile! 
Be my \vife, 

My guide, my good angel, iny all 
upon earth, 

And accept, for the sake of what yet 
may give worth 

To my life, its contrition!" 

XV. 

He paused, for there came 

O'er the cheek of Lucile a swift flush 
like the flame 

That illumined at moments the dark- 
ness o'erliead. 

With a voice faint and marred by 
emotion, slie said, 

"And yom- pledge to another ? " 

XVI. 

"Hush, hush!" he exclaimed, 
" My honor will live where my love 

lives, unshamed. 
'Twere poor honor, indeed, to another 

to give 
That life of which you keep the 

lieart. Could I live 
In the light of those young eyes, sup- 
pressing a lie ? 
Alas, no ! yuur liand holds my whole 

destiny. 
I can never recall what my lips have 

avowed; 
In your love lies whatever can render 

me proud. 
For the great crime of all my exist- 
ence hath been 
To have known you in vain. And 

the duty best seen. 
And most hallowed, — the duty most 

sacred and sweet, 
Is that which hath led me, Lucile, to 

your feet. 
O speak ! and restore me the blessing 

I lost 
When I lost you, — my pearl of all 

pearls beyond cost ! 
And restore to your own life its 

youth, and restore 
The vision, the rapture, the passion 

of yore! 



Ere our brows had been dimmed in 
the dust of the world, 

Wlien our souls their white wings 
3'et exulting, mifurled! 

For your eyes rest no more on the 
luiquiet man, 

The wild star of whose course its pale 
orbit outran, 

Whom the formless indefinite future 
of youth. 

With its lying allurements, distract- 
ed. In truth 

I have wearily wandered the world, 
and I feel 

That the least of yom* lovely regards, 
O Lucile, 

Is worth all the world can afford, and 
the dream 

Which, though followed forever, for- 
ever doth seem 

As fleeting, and distant, and dim, as 
of yore 

When it brooded in twilight, at dawn, 
on the shore 

Of life's imtraversed ocean I I know 
the sole path 

To repose, wliich my desolate destiny 
liath. 

Is the path by whose course to your 
feet I return. 

And who else, O Lucile, will so truly 
discern. 

And so deeply revere, all the passion- 
ate strength. 

The sublimity in j-ou, as he whom at 
length 

These have saved from himself, for 
the truth they reveal 

To his worship ?" 

xvn. 

She spoke not ; but Alfred could 

feel 
The light hand and arm, that upon 

him reposed. 
Thrill and tremble. Those dark 

eyes of hers were half closed; 
But, under their languid mysterious 

fringe, 
A passionate softness was beaming. 

One tinge 



4S, 



LUCILE. 



Of faint inward fire flushed trans- 
parently through 

The delicate, pallid, and pure olive 
hue 

Of the cheek, half averted and 
drooped. The rich bosom 

Heaved, as Avlien in the heart of a 
ruffled I'ose-blossom 

A bee is imprisoned and struggles. 

XVIII. 

Meanwhile 
The sun, in his setting, sent up the 

last smile 
Of his power, to baffle the storm. 

And, behold! 
O'er the mountains embattled, his 

armies, all gold, 
Eose and rested: while far up the 

dim airy crags. 
Its artillery silenced, its banners in 

rags. 
The rear of the tempest its sullen re- 
treat 
Drew off slowly, receding in silence, 

to meet 
The powers of the night, which, now 

gathering afar. 
Had already sent forward one briglit, 

signal star. 
The ciu-ls of her soft and luxuriant 

hair. 
From the dark riding-hat, which 

Lucile used to wear, 
Had escaped ; and Lord Alfred now 

covered with kisses 
The redolent warmth of those long 

falling tresses. 
Neither he, nor Lucile, felt the rain, 

which not yet 
Had ceased falling around them; 

when, splashed, drenched, and 

wet. 
The Due de Luvois down the rough 

mountain course 
Approached them as fast as the road, 

and his horse. 
Which was limping, would suffer. 

The beast had just now 
Lost his footing, and over the peril- 
ous brow 



Of the storm-haunted moimtain his 

master had thrown; 
But the Duke, who was agile, had 

leaped to a stone, 
And the horse, being bred to the in- 
stinct which fills 
The breast of the wild mountaineer 

in these hills. 
Had scrambled again to his feet ; ard 

now master 
And horse bore about them the signs 

of disaster. 
As they heavily footed their way 

through the mist, 
The horse with his shoulder, the 

Duke with his wrist, 
Bruised and bleeding. 



If ever your feet, like my own, 

O reader, have traversed these moun- 
tains alone, 

Have you felt yoiur identity shrink 
and contract 

At the sound of the distant and dim 
cataract. 

In the presence of nature's immen- 
sities ? Say, 

Have you hung o'er the torrent, be- 
dewed with its spray. 

And, leaving the rock-way, contort- 
ed and rolled, 

Like a huge couchant Typhon, fold 
heaped over fold. 

Tracked the summits, from which 
every step that you tread 

KoUs the loose stones, with thimder 
below, to the bed 

Of invisible waters, whose mystical 
sound 

Fills with awful suggestions the 
dizzy profound i^ 

And, laboring onwards, at last 
through a break 

In the walls of the world, burst at 
at once on the lake ? 

If you have, this description I might 
have M'itliheld. 

You remember how strangely yoiur 
bosom has swelled 



LUCILE. 



49 



At the vision revealed. On the over- 
worked soil 

Of this planet, enjoyment is sharp- 
ened by toil ; 

And one seems, by the pain of as- 
cending the height, 

To have conquered a claim to that 
wonderful sight. 



Hail, virginal daughter of cold Es- 
ping6 ! 

Hail, Naiad, whose realm is the 
cloud and the snow ; 

For o'er thee the angels have whi- 
tened their wings. 

And the thirst of the seraphs is 
quenched at thy springs. 

What hand hatli, in heaven, upheld 
thine expanse ? 

When the breath of creation first 
fashioned fair France, 

Did the Spirit of 111, in his down- 
throw appalling, 

Bruise the world, and thus hollow 
thy basin while falling ? 

Ere the mammoth was born hath 
some monster unnamed 

The base of thy mountainous pedes- 
tal framed ? 

And later, when Power to Beauty 
was wed. 

Did some delicate fairy embroider 
thy bed 

With the fragile valerian and wild 
columbine ? 



But thy secret thou keepest, and I 

will keep mine ; 
For once gazing on thee, it flashed 

on my soul. 
All that secret ! I saw in a vision 

the whole 
Vast design of the ages ; what was 

and shall be ! 
Hands imseen raised the veil of a 

great mystery 
For one moment. I saw, and I 

heard ; and my heart 
Bore witness within me to infinite 

art, 



In infiiaite power proving infinite 

love ; 
Caught the great choral chant, 

marked the dread pageant 

move — 
The divine Whence and Whither of 

life ! But, O daughter 
Of Oo, not more safe in the deep 

silent water 
Is thy secret, than mine in my heart. 

Even so. 
"WTiat I then saw and heard, the 

world never shall know. 



The dimness of eve o'er the valleys 
had closed. 

The rain had ceased falling, the 
mountains reposed. 

The stars had enldndled in luminous 
courses 

Their slow-sliding lamps, when, re- 
mounting their horses. 

The riders retraversed that mighty 
serration 

Of rock-work. Thus left to its own 
desolation. 

The lake, from whose glimmering 
limits the last 

Transient pomp of the pageants of 
sunset had passed, 

Drew into its bosom the darkness, 
and only [lonely 

Admitted within it one image, — a 

And tremulous phantom of flicker- 
ing light 

That followed the mystical moon 
through the night. 

XXIII. 

It was late when o' er Serchon at last 
. they descended. 

To her chalet, in silence, Lord Al- 
fred attended 

Lucile. As they parted she whisper- 
ed him low, 

" You have made to me, Alfred, an 
offer I know 

All the worth of, believe me. I can- 
not reply 

Without time for reflection. Good 
night I — not good by." 



50 



LUCILE. 



"Alas ! 'tis the very same answer 

you made 
To the Due de Luvois but a day 

since," he said. 
"No, Alfred ! the very same, no," 

she replied. 
Her voice shook. " If you love me, 

obey me. 
Abide my answer, to-morrow." 

XXIV. 

Alas, Cousin Jack ! 
Tou Cassandra in breeches and 

boots ! tm-n your back 
To the ruins of Troy. Prophet, 

seek not for gloiy 
Amongst thine own people. 

I follow my stoiy. 



CANTO V. 



Up ! — forth again, Pegasus 1 — 

" Many's the slip," 
Hath the proverb well said, " 'twixt 

the cup and the lip ! " 
How blest should we be, have I often 

conceived. 
Had we really achieved what we 

nearly achieved ! 
We but catch at the skirts of the 

thing we would be, 
And fall back on the lap of a false 

destiny. 
So it will be, so has been, since this 

world began ! 
And the happiest, noblest, and best 

part of man 
Is the part which he never hath 

fully played out : 
For the first and last word in life's 

voliune is — Doubt. 
The face the most fair to oiu* vision 

allowed 
Is the face we encounter and lose in 

the crowd. 
The thought that most thrills om* 

existence is one 
Which, before we can frame it iu 

language, is gone. 



Horace ! the rustic still rests by 

the river. 

But the river flows on, and Hows 
past him forever ! 

Who can sit down, and say, .... 
"What I will be, I will"? 

Who stand up, and aflirm .... 
" AVhat I was, I am still " ? 

Who is it that must not, if ques- 
tioned, say, . . . "What 

1 would have remamed, or become, 

I am not" ? 
We are ever behind, or beyond, or 

beside [hide 

Our intrinsic existence. Forever at 
And seek with our souls. Not in 

Hades alone 
Doth Sisyphus roll, ever frustrate, 

the stone, 
Do the Dana'ids ply, ever vainly, the 

sieve. 
Tasks as futile does earth to its den- 
izens give. 
Yet there's none so unhappy, but 

what he hath been 
Just about to be hapijy, at some time, 

I ween ; 
And none so beguiled and defrauded 

by chance, 
But what once, in his life, some 

niinxUe circmnstance 
Woidd have fully sufficed to secm-e 

him the bliss 
Which, missing it then, he forever 

must miss ; 
And to most of us, ere w'e go down 

to the grave. 
Life, relenting, accords the good 

gift we would have ; 
But, as though by some strange im- 
perfection in fate. 
The g6od gift, when it comes, comes 

a moment too late. 
The FvUure's great veU om* breath 

titfully flaps. 
And behind it broods ever the migh- 
ty Perhaps. 
Yet ! there's many a slip 'twixt the 

cup and the lip ; 
But while o'er the brim of life's 

beaker I dip. 



LUCILE. 



SI 



Though the cup may next moment 

be shattered, the wine 
Spilt, one deep health I'll pledge, 

and that health shall be thine, 
O being of beauty and bliss ! seen 

and known 
In the deeps of my soul, and pos- 
sessed there alone ! 
My days know thee not ; and my 

lips name thee never. 
Thy place in my poor life is vacant 

forever. 
We have met : we have parted. No 

more is recorded 
In my annals on earth. This alone 

was afforded 
To the man whom men knew me, or 

deem me, to be. 
But, far down, in the depth of my 

life's mystery 
(Like the siren that imder the deep 

ocean dwells, 
Whom the wind as it wails, and the 

wave as it swells, 
Cannot stir in the calm of her coral- 
line halls, 
'Mid the world's adamantine and 

dim pedestals ; 
At whose feet sit the sylphs and sea 

fairies ; for whom 
The almondine glimmers, the soft 

samphires bloom) — 
Thou abidest and reignest forever, 

O Queen 
Of that better world which thou 

swayest xniseen ! 
My one perfect mistress ! my all 

things in all ! 
Thee by no vulgar name known to 

men do I call : 
For the seraphs have named thee to 

me in my sleep, 
And that name is a secret I sacredly 

keep. 
But, wherever this nature of mine 

is most fair. 
And its thoughts are the purest — be- 
loved, thou art there ! 
And whatever is noblest in aught I 

that 1 do, [too. 

Is done to exalt and to worship thee | 



The world gave thee not to me, no ! 
and the world 

Cannot take thee aAvay from me 
now. I have furled 

The wings of my spirit about thy 
briglit head ; 

At thy feet are my soul's immortal- 
ities spread. 

Thou mightest have been to me 
much. Thou art more. 

And in silence I worship, in dark- 
ness adore. 

If life be not that which without us 
we find — 

Chance, accident, merely — but rath- 
er the mind. 

And tlie soul which, within us, sm- 
viveth these things. 

If our real existence have traly its 
springs 

Less in that which we do than in 
that which we feel, 

Not in vain do I worship, not liope- 
less I kneel ! 

For then, though I name thee not 
mistress or wife. 

Thou art mine — and mine only, — O 
life of my life ! 

And though many's the slip 'twixt 
the cup and the lip. 

Yet while o'er the brim of life's 
beaker I dip, 

Wliile there's life on the lip, while 
there's warmth in the wine. 

One deep health I'll pledge, and that 
health shall be thine I 



This world, on whose peaceable 
breast Ave repose 

Unconvulsed by alarm, once con- 
fused in the throes 

Of a tumult divine, sea and land, 
moist and dry. 

And in fieiy fusion commixed earth 
and sky. 

Time cooled it, and calmed it, and 
taught it to go 

The round of its orbit in peace, long 
ago. 



52 



LUCILE. 



The wind changeth and whirleth. 
continually : 

All the rivers run down and run into 
the sea : 

The wind whirleth about, and is 
presently stilled : 

All the rivers run down, yet the sea 
is not filled : 

The sun goeth forth from his cham- 
bers : the sun 

Ariseth, and lo ! he descendeth 
anon. 

All returns to its place. Use and 
Habit are powers 

Far stronger than Passion, in this 
world of ours. 

The great laAvs of life readjust their 
infraction, 

And to every emotion appoint a re- 
action. 

III. 

Alfred Vargrave had time,after leav- 
ing Lucile, 

To review the rash step he had ta- 
ken, and feel 

What the world Avould have called 
" Ida erroneoit.s jwsition.'" 

Thought obtruded its claim, and en- 
forced recognition : 

Like a creditor who, when the gloss 
is worn out 

On the coat which we once wore 
with pleasure, no doubt, 

Sends us in his account for the gar- 
ment we bought. 

Eveiy spendthrift to passion is debt- 
or to thought. 



He felt ill at ease with himself. He 
could feel 

Little doubt what the answer would 
be from Lxicile. 

Her eyes, when they parted,— her 
voice, when they met. 

Still enraptured his heart, which 
they haunted. And yet, 

Though, exulting, he deemed him- 
self loved, where he loved, 

Through his mind a vague self-ac- 
cusation there moved. 



O'er his fancy, when fancy was fair- 
est, \vould rise 
The infantine face of Matilda, with 

eyes 
So sad, so reproachful, so cruelly 

kind. 
That his heart failed within him. 

In vain did he find 
A thousand just reasons for what he 

had done : 
The vision that troubled him would 

not be gone. 
In vain did he say to himself, and 

with truth, 
' ' Matilda has beauty and fortune, 

and youth ; 
And her heart is too yomig to have 

deeply involved 
All its hopes in the tie which must 

now be dissolved. 
'Twere a false sense of honor in me 

to suppress 
The sad truth which I owe it to her 

to confess. 
And what reason have I to presume 

this poor life 
Of my own, with its languid and 

frivolous strife. 
And without what alone might en- 
dear it to her. 
Were a boon all so precious, indeed, 

to confer, 
Its withdrawal can wrong her ? 

' ' It is not as though 
I were bound to some poor village 

maiden, I know. 
Unto whose simple heart mine were 

all upon earth, 
Or to whose simple fortunes my own 

could give worth. 
Matilda, in all the world's gifts, will 

not miss 
Aught that I could procure her. 

'Tis best as it is !" 



V. 

In vain did he say to himself, 

"When I came 
To this fatal spot, I had nothing to 

blame 



LUCILE. 



53 



Or reproach myself for, in the 
thoughts of my heart. 

I could not foresee that its pulses 
would start 

Into siich strange emotion on seeing 
once more 

A woman I left with indifference be- 
fore. 

I believed, and with honest convic- 
tion believed, 

In my love for Matilda. I never 
conceived 

Tliat another could shake it. I 
deemed I had done 

With the wild heart of youth, and 
looked hopefully on 

To the soberer manhood, the wor- 
thier life. 

Which I sought in the love that I 
vowed to my wife. 

Poor child ! she shall learn the 
whole truth. She shall know 

What I knew not myself but a few 
days ago. 

The world will console lier, — her 
pride will support, — 

Her youth will renew its emotions. 
In short, 

Thei'e is nothing in me that Matilda 
will miss 

When once we have parted. 'Tis 
best as it is ! " 



But in vain did he reason and ar- 
gue. Alas ! 

He yet felt unconvinced that Hwas 
best as it was. 

Out of reacli of all reason, forever 
would rise 

That infantine face of Matilda, with 
eyes 

So sad, so reproachful, so cruelly 
kind, 

That they harrowed his heart and 
distracted his mind. 



And then, when he turned from 
these thouglits to Lucile, 

Though his heart rose enraptured, 
he could not but feel 



A vague sense of awe of her nature. 

Behind 
All the beauty of heart, and the 

graces of mind, 
Wbich he saw and revered in her, 

something unknown 
And unseen in tliat nature still 

troubled his o-\vn. 
He felt that Lucile penetrated and 

prized 
Whatever wa.s noblest and best, 

though disguised. 
In himself ; but he did not feel sure 

that he knew. 
Or completely possessed, what, half 

liidden from view, 
Eemaiued lofty and lonely in lier. 

Then, her life. 
So untamed, and so free 1 would she 

yield as a wife. 
Independence, long claimed as a wo- 
man ? Her name. 
So linlvcd by the world with that 

spurious fame 
Which the beauty and wit of a wo- 
man assert. 
In some measure, alas ! to her own 

loss and hurt 
In the serious thoughts of a man ! 

.... This reflection 
O'er the love which he felt cast a 

shade of dejection. 
From which he forever escaped to 

the thought 
Doubt could reach not. . . . "Hove 

her, and all else is naught ! " 

VTII. 

His hand trembled strangely in 

breaking the seal 
Of the letter which reached him at 

last from Lucile. 
At the sight of the very first word 

that he read. 
That letter dropped down from his 

hand like the dead 
Leaf in autumn, that, falling, leaves 

naked and bare 
A desolate tree in a wide wintry air. 
He passed his hand hurriedly over 

his eyes, [prise 

Bewildered, incredulous. Angry sur- 



54 



LUCILE. 



And dismay, in one sharp moan, 
broke, from him. Anon 

He picked up the page, and read rap- 
idly on. 

IX. 
The COMTESSB DE XeVEKS to LOED 

Alfked Vaiigkave. 

"No, Alfred ! 

" If over the present, -when last 
We two met, rose the glamour and 

mist of the past, 
It hath now rolled away, and om* 

two paths are plain, 
And those two paths divide us. 

" Tliat hand which again 
Mine one moment has clasped as the 

hand of a brother, 
That hand and your honor are 

pledged to another ! 
Forgive, Alfred Vargrave, forgive 

me, if yet 
For that moment (now past !) I have 

made yon forget 
What was due to yourself and that 

other one. Yes, 
Mine the fault, and be mine the re- 
pentance ! Not less 
In now owning this fault, Alfred, 

let me own, too, 
I foresaw not the sorrow involved 

in it, 

" True, 
That meeting, which hath been so 

fatal, 1 sought, 
1 alone ! But O, deem not it was 

with the thought 
Or your heart to regain, or the past 

to rewaken. 
No ! believe me, it was with the 

firm and unshaken 
Conviction, at least, that om* meet- 
ing would be 
Without peril to you, although haply 

to me 
The salvation of all my existence. 

" I own. 
When the rumor fii-st reached me, 

which lightly made known 
To the world your engagement, my 

heart and my mind 



Suffered tortnre Intense. It was 

cruel to find 
That so much of tlie life of my life 

half unknown 
To myself, had been silently settled 

on one 
Upon whom btit to think it would 

soon be a crime. 
Then I said to myself, ' From the 

thraldom which time 
Hath not weakened there rests but 

one hope of escape. 
That image which Fancy seems ever 

to shape 
From the solitude left round the 

ruins of yore 
Is a phantom. The Being I loved 

is no more. 
What I hear in the silence, and see 

in the lone 
Yoid of life, is the yo\uig hero bom 

of my own 
Perished youth : and his image, se- 
rene and subUme, 
In my heart rests unconscious of 

change and of time. 
Could I see it but once more, as time 

and as change 
Have made it, a thing tmfamiliar and 

strange, 
See, indeed, that the Being I loved in 

my youth 
Is no more, and what rests now is 

only, in truth. 
The hard pupil of life and the world ; 

then, O, then, 
I should wake from a dream, and my 

life be again 
Keconciled to the world ; and, re- 
leased from regret. 
Take the lot fate accords to my 

choice.' 

"So we met. 
But the danger I did not foresee has 

occurred : 
The danger, alas, to yourself ! I have 

erred. 
But happy for both that this error 

hath been 
Discovered as soon as the danger was 

seen ! 



LUCILE. 



55 



We meet, Alfred Vargrave, no more. 
I, indeed, 

Shall be far from Serclion when this 
letter you read. 

My course is decided ; my path I dis- 
cern : 

Doubt is over ; my future is fixed 
now. 

" Return, 

return to the young living love! 

Whence, alas ! 
If, one moment, you wandered, think 

only it was 
More deej)ly to bury the past love. 

"And, oh! 
Believe, Alfred Vargrave, that I, 

where I go 
On my far distant pathway through 

life, shall rejoice 
To treasure in memory all that your 

voice 
Has avowed to me, all in which 

others have clothed 
To my fancy with beauty and worth 

your betrothed ! 
In the fair morning light, in the 

orient dew 
Of that yoiuig life, now yours, can 

you fail to renew 
All the noble and pure aspirations, 

the truth, 
The freshness, the faith, of your own 

earnest youth ? 
Yes! you will be happy. I, too, in 

the bliss 

1 foresee for you, I shall be happy. 

And this 
Proves me worthy your friendship. 

And so — let it prove 
That I cannot — I do not — respond to 

your love. 
Yes, indeed ! be convinced that I 

could not (no, no. 
Never, never !) have rendered you 

happy. And so, 
Rest assured that, if false to the vows 

you have plighted, 
You would have endured, when the 

first brief, excited 
Emotion was o'er, not alone the re- 
morse 



Of honor, but also (to render it worse) 

Disappointed affection. 

" Yes, Alfred ; you start? 

But think ! if the world was too 
much in your heart. 

And too little in mine, when we 
parted ten years 

Ere this last fatal meeting, that time 
(ay, and tears !) 

Have but deepened the old demarca- 
tions which then 

Placed our natures asunder ; and we 
two again. 

As we then were, would still have 
been strangely at strife. 

In that self-independence which is to 
my life 

Its necessity now, as it o^ice was its 
pride. 

Had oiir coiu-se through the world 
been henceforth side by side, 

I should have revolted forever, and 
shocked, 

Your respect for the world's plausi- 
bilities, mocked, 

Without meaning to do so, and out- 
raged, all those 

Social creeds wliicli you live by. 

" Oh! do not suppose 

That I blame you. Perhaps it is you 
that are right. 

Best, then, all as it is ! 

"Deem these words life's Good- 
night 

To the hope of a moment : no morel 
If there fell 

Any tear on this page, 'twas a 
friend's. 

"So farewell 

To the past — and to you, Alfred Var- 
grave. 

"LUCILE." 



So ended that letter. 

The room seemed to reel 
Rovind and round in the mist that 

was scorching his eyes 
With a fiery dew. Grief, resentment, 

surprise, 



Half choked him ; each word he had 

read, as it smote 
Down some hope, rose and grasped 

hke a hand at his tliroat, 
To stifle and strangle him. 

Gasping already 
For rehef from himself, with a foot- 
step unsteady, 
He passed from his chamber. He 

felt both oppressed 
And excited. The letter he thrust 

in his breast, 
And, in search of fresli air and of 

solitude, passed 
The long lime-trees of Serchon. His 

footsteps at last 
Reached a bare narrow heath by the 

skirts of a wood : 
It was sombre and silent, and suited 

Ills mood. 
By a mineral spring, long unused, 

now unknown, 
Stood a small ruined abbey. He 

reached it, sat down 
On a fragment of stone, 'mid the 

wild weed and thistle. 
And read over again that peiplexing 

epistle. 



In re-reading that letter, there rolled 

from his mind 
The raw mist of resentment which 

first made him blind 
To the pathos breathed through it. 

Tears rose in his eyes. 
And a hope sweet and strange in his 

heart seemed to rise. 
The truth which he saw not the fii-st 

time he read 
That letter, he now saw, — that each 

word betrayed 
The love which the writer had sought 

to conceal. 
His love was received not, he could 

not but feel, 
For one reason alone, — that his love 

was not free. 
True ! free yet he was not : but could 

he not bo 



Free ere long, free as air to revoke 
that farewell, 

And to sanction his own hopes ? he 
had but to tell 

The truth to Matilda, and she were 
the first 

To release him : he had but to wait 
at the worst. 

Matilda's relations would probably 
snatch 

Any pretext, with pleasure, to break 
off a match 

In which they had yielded, alone at 
the whim 

Of their spoiled child, a languid ap- 
proval to him. 

Sh« herself, careless child ! was her 
love for him aught 

Save the first joyous fancy succeed- 
ing the thought 

She last gave to her doll ? was she 
able to feel 

Such a love as the love he divined in 
Lucile ? 

He would seek her, obtain his re- 
lease, and, oh ! then, 

He had but to fly to Lucile, and again 

Claim the love which his heart would 
be free to command. 

But to press on Lucile any claim to 
her hand. 

Or even to seek, or to see her, before 

He could say, " I am free! free, Lu- 
cile, to implore 

That great blessing on life you alone 
can confer," 

'Twere dishonor in liim, 'twould be 
insult to her. 

Thus still Mith the letter outspread 
on his knee 

He followed so fondly his own rev- 
ery, 

That he felt not the angry regard of 
a man 

Fixed upon him ; he saw not a face 
stern and wan 

Turned towards him ; he heard not 
a footstep that passed 

And repassed the lone spot where ho 
stood, till at last 

A hoarse voice aroused him. 



LUCILE. 



57 



He looked up and saw, 
On the bare heath before him, the 

Due de Luvois. 
sn. 
With aggressive ironical tones, and 

a look 
Of concentrated insolent challenge, 

the Duke 
Addressed to Lord Alfred some 

sneering allusion 
To " the doubtless sublime reveries 

his intrusion 
Had, he feared, interrupted. Mi- 
lord would do better. 
He fancied, however, to fold up a 

letter 
The writing of which was too well 

known, in fact, 
His remark as he passed to have 

failed to attract." 

XIII. 

It was obvious to Alfred the French- 
man was bent 

Upon picking a quarrel I and doubt- 
less 'twas meant 

From him to provoke it by sneers 
such as these. 

A moment suthced his quick instinct 
to seize 

The position. He felt that he could 
not expose 

His own name, or Lucile's, oV Ma- 
tilda'jf;, to those 

Idle tongues that would bring down 
tipon him the ban 

Of the world, if he now were to fight 
witli this man. 

And indeed, when he looked in the 
Duko's hagganl face. 

He was pained by the change there 
he could not but trace. 

And he almost felt pity. 

He Iherofore put by 

Each remark from the Duke with 
some careless reply, 

^\jid coldly, but courteously, waving 
away 

The ill-luuuor the Duke seemed re- 
solved to display, 

Kose, and turned, with a stern salu- 
tation, aside. 



Then the Duke put himself in the 
path, made one stride 

In advance, raised a hand, fixed 
upon him his eyes, 

And said . . . 

" Hold, Lord Alfred ! Away with 
disguise ! 

I will own that I sought you a mo- 
ment ago. 

To fix on you a quarrel. I still can 
do so 

L'pon any excuse. I prefer to be 
fraitk. 

I admit not a rival in fortune or 
rank 

To the hand of a woman, whatever 
be hers 

Or her suitor s. I love the Comtesse 
de Nevers. 

I believed, ere you crosse«.i me, and 
still have the right 

To believe, that she would have been 
mine. To her sight 

You return, and the woman is sud- 
denly ch.anged. 

You step in between us : her heart 
is estranged. 

You ! who now are betrothed to 
another, I know : 

You ! whose name with Lucile'i 
nearly ten years ago 

Was coupled by ties which you broke : 
you! the man 

I reproached on the day our acquaint- 
ance began : 

You! that left her so lightly, — I can- 
not believe 

That you love, as I love, her ; nor 
can I conceive 

You, indeed, have the right so to 
love her. 

"Milord 

I will not thus tamely concede, at 
your word, 

■What, a few days ago, I believed to 
be mine ! 

I shall yet pei-severe: 1 shall yet be, 
in tine, 

A rival you dare not despise. It is 
plain 



58 



LUCILE. 



That to settle this contest there can 

but remain 
One way— need I say what it is ? " 

XV. 

Not unmoved 

With regretful respect for the earn- 
estness proved 

By the speech he liad heard, Alfred 
Vargrave rephed 

In words which he trusted might 
yet turn aside 

The quarrel from which he felt 
bound to abstain, 

And, with stately urbanity, strove to 
explain 

To the Duke that he too (a fair 
rival at worst ! ) 

Had not been accepted. 

XVI. 

" Accepted! say first 
Are you free to have offered ? " 

Lord Alfred was mute. 



" Ah, you dare not reply ! " cried the 

Duke. " Why dispute, 
Why palter with me ? You are 

silent ! and why ? 
Because, in your conscience, you 

cannot deny 
'Twas from vanity, wanton and 

cruel withal, 
And the wish an ascendency lost to 

recall. 
That you stepped in between me and 

her. If, milord, 
You be really sincere, I ask only one 

word. 
Say at once you renounce her. At 

once, on my part, 
I will ask your forgiveness vvitli all 

trutli of heart, 
And there can be no quarrel between 

us. Say on!" 
L*rd Alfred grew galled and im- 
patient. Tliis tone 
Housed a strong irritation he could 

not repress. 
" Ton have not the right, sir," he 

said, "and still less 



The power, to make terms and con- 
ditions with me. 
I refuse to reply." 

XVfll. 

As diviners may see 
Fates they cannot avert in some 

figure occult. 
He foresaw in a moment each evil 

result 
Of the quarrel now Imminent. 

There, face to face, 
'Mid the ruins and tombs of a long- 

perislied race, 
With, tor witness, the stern Autumn 

Sky overliead. 
And beneath them, unnoticed, the 

graves, and the dead, 
Those two men had met, as it were 

ou the ridge 
Of that perilous, narrow, invisible 

bridge 
Dividing the Past from the Future, 

so small 
That, if one should pass over, the 

other must fall. 

XIX. 

On the ear, at that, moment, the 

sound of a hoof, 
Urged with speed, sharply smote ; 

and from under the roof 
Of the forest in view, where the 

skirts of it verged 
On the lieath where they stood, at 

full gallop emerged 
A horseman. 

A guide he appeared, by the sash 
Of red silk round the waist, and the 

long leathern lash 
With the short wooden handle, slung 

crosswise behind 
The short jacket ; the loose canvas 

trouser, confined 
By the hmg boots ; tlie woollen ca- 
pote ; and the rein, 
A mere hempen cord on a curb. 

Up the plain 
He wheeled his horse, white with the 

foam on his flank. 
Leaped the rivulet lightly, turned 

sharp from the bank. 



LUCILE. 



59 



And, approacliing the Duke, raised 

his woolleu capote, 
Bowed low in the selle, and deUv- 

ered a note. 

XX. 

The two stood astonished. The 

Duke, with a gest 
Of apology, tutued, stretclied his 

liand, and possessed 
Himself of the letter, changed color, 

and tore 
The page open, and read. 

Ere a moment was o'er 
His whole aspect changed. A light 

rose to his eyes, 
And a smile to his lips. While with 

staitled surprise 
Loi'd Alfred yet watched him, he 

turned on his heel, 
And said gayly, "A pressing re- 
quest from Lucile ! 
You are quite riglit, Lord Alfred ; fair 

rivals at worst. 
Our relative place may perchance be 

reversed, 
Tou are not accepted — ^nor free to 

propose ! 
I, perchance, am accepted already; 

who knows ? 
I had warned you, milord, I should 

still persevere. 
This letter — but stay! you can read it 

— look here!" 

XXI. 

It was now Alfred's turn to feel 
roused and enraged. 

But Lucile to himself was not pledged 
or engaged 

By aught that could sanction resent- 
ment. He said 

Not a word, but turned round, took 
the letter, and read . . . 

ThQ CoMTESSE DE Nevers to the 
Due I)E Luvois. 

" Saixt Saviour. 
" Your letter, which followed me 

here, makes me stay 
Till I see you again. With no mo- 
ment's delay. 



I entreat, I conjure you, by all that 
you feel 

Or profess, to come to me directly. 
"Lucile." 
xxn. 

"Your letter!" He then had been 
writing to her! 

Coldly shrugging his shoulders, Lord 
Alfred said, " Sir, 

Do not let me detain you! " 

The Duke smiled and bowed; 

Placed the note in his bosom; ad- 
dressed, half aloud, 

A few words to the messenger: . . . 
" kSay your despatch 

Will be answered ere nightfall ; " then 
glanced at his watch. 

And turned back to the Baths. 

XXIII. 

Alfred Vargrave stood still, 
Torn, distracted in heart, and divided 

in will. 
He turned to Lucile' s farewell letter 

to him. 
And read over her words ; rising tears 

made them dim ; 
'^ Doubt is over: my future is fixed 

noio," they said, 
"My course is decided." Her 

course ? what ! to wed 
With this iusolent rival! With that 

thought there shot 
Through his heart an acute jealous 

anguish. But not 
Even thus could his clear worldly 

sense quite excuse 
Those strange words to the Duke. 

She was free to refuse 
Himself, free the Duke to accept, it 

was true: 
Even then, though, this eager and 

strange rendezvous 
How imprudent! To some unfre- 
quented lone inn. 
And so late (for the night was about 

to begin) — 
She, compauionless there! — had she 

bidden that man ? 
A fear, vague, and formless, and hor- 
rible, ran 
Through his h«art. 



6o 



LUCILE. 



XXIV. 

At that moment lie looked up, and 

saw, 
Riding fast through the forest, the 

Due de Luvois, 
yPno waved his hand to him, and 

sped out of sight. 
The day was descending. He felt 

'twould be night 
Ere that man reached Saint Saviour. 

XXV. 

He walked on, but not 
Back toward Serchon : he walked on, 

but knew not in what 
Direction, nor yet with what object, 

indeed, 
He was walking ; but still he walked 

on without heed. 

XXVI. 

The day had been sullen ; but, 

towards his decline. 
The sun sent a stream of wild light 

up the pine. 
Darkly denting the red light revealed 

at its back, 
The old ruined abbey rose roofless 

and black. 
The spring that yet oozed through 

the moss-paven floor 
Had suggested, no doubt, to the 

monks there, of yore, 
The site of that refuge where, back 

to its God 
How many a heart, now at rest 

'neath the sod, 
Had borne from the world all the 

same wild unrest 
That now preyed on his ownl 

XXVII. 

By the thoughts in his breast 
With varying impulse divided and 

torn, 
He traversed the scant heath, and 

reached the forlorn 
Autmnn woodland, in which but a 

short while ago 
He had seen the Diike rapidly enter ; 

and so 



He too entered. The light waned 
around him, and passed 

Into darkness. The wrathful, red 
Occident cast 

One glare of vindictive inquiry be- 
hind. 

As the last light of day from the high 
wood declined. 

And the great forest sighed its fare 
well to the beam. 

And far off on the stillness the voice 
of the stream 

Fell faintly. 

XXVIII. 

O Natm-e, how fair is thy face, 
And how light is thy heart, and how 

friendless thy grace! 
Thou false mistress of man! thou 

dost sport with him lightly 
In his hours of ease and enjoyment; 

and brightly 
Dost thou smile to his smile; to his 

joys thou inclinest, 
But his sorrows, thou knowest them 

not, nor divinest. 
While he woos, thoii art wanton; 

thou lettest him love thee; 
But thou art not his friend, for his 

grief cannot move thee; 
And at last, when he sickens and 

dies, what dost thou ? 
All as gay are thy garments, as care- 
less thy brow, 
And thou laughest and toyest with 

any new comer. 
Not a tear more for winter, a smile 

less for summer ! 
Hast thou never an anguish to heave 

the heart under 
That fan- breast of thine, O thou 

feminine wonder! 
For all those — the young, and the 

fair, and the strong, 
Who have loved thee, and lived with 

thee gayly and long. 
And who now on thy bosom lie dead ? 

and their deeds 
And their days are forgotten ! O, 

hast thou no weeds 
And not one year of mourning, — one 

out of the. many 



LUCILE. 



6t 



That deck thy uew bridals forever, — 
nor any 

Regrets for thy lost loves, concealed 
from the new, 

O thou widow of earth's genera- 
tions ? Go to ! 

If the sea and the night wind know 
aught of these things, 

Tliey do not reveal it. We are not 
thy kings. 



CANTO VI. 



" The huntsman has ridden too far 

on the chase, 
And eldrich, and eerie, and strange 

is tlie place I 
The castle betokens a date long gone 

He crosses the court-yard with curi- 
ous eye : 
He wanders from chamber to cham- 
ber, and yet 
From strangeness to strangeness his 

footsteps are set ; 
And the whole place grows wilder 

and wilder, and less 
Like aught seen before. Each in 

obsolete dress. 
Strange portraits regard him with 

looks of surprise, 
Strange forms from the arras start 

forth to his eyes; 
Strange epigraphs, blazoned, burn 

Qut of the wall: 
The spell of a \\ izard is over it all. 
In her chamber, enchanted, the 

Princess is sleeping 
The sleep which for centuries she 

has been keeping. 
If she smile in her sleep, it must be 

to some lover 
Whose lost golden locks the long 

grasses now cover: 
•If she moan in her dream, it must 

be to deplore 
Some grief which the woi-ld cares to 

hear of no more. 
But how fair is her forehead, how 

calm seems her cheek I 



And how sweet must that voice Ic, 
if once she would speak 

He looks and he loves her ; but 
knows he (not he ! ) 

The clew to unravel this old mys- 
tery? 

And he stoops to those shut lips. 
The shapes on the wall. 

The mute men in armor around hiiu, 
and all 

The weird figures fi'own, as though 
striving to say, 

' Halt ! invade not the Past, reck- 
less child of To-day ! 

And give not, O madman ! the heart 
in thy breast 

To a phantom, the soul of whose 
sense is possessed 

By an Aye not thine oion ! ' 

" But unconscious is he, 

And he heeds not the warning, he 
cares not to see 

Aught but one form before him I 

" Rash, wild M'ords are o'ei 

And the vision is vanished from 
sight evermore ! 

And the gray morning sees, as it 
drearily moves 

O'er a land long deserted, a madman 
that roves 

Through a ruin, and seeks to re- 
capture a dream. 

Lost to life and its uses, withdrawn 
from the scheme 

Of man's waking existence, he wan- 
ders apart." 

And this is an old fairy-tale of the 
heart. 

It is told in all lands, in a different 
tongue ; 

Told with tears by the old, heard 
with smiles by the young. 

And the tale to each heart unto 
which it is known 

Has a different sense. It has puz- 
zled my own. 

ir. 
Eugene de Luvois was a man who, 

in part 
From strong physical health, and 

that vigor of heart 



62 



LUCILE. 



Which physical health gives, and 

partly, perchance, 
From a generous vanity native to 

France, 
With the heart of a hunter, Tvhat- 

ever the quarry. 
Pursued it, too hotly impatient to 

tarry 
Or turn, till he took it. His trophies 

were trifles : 
]}ut trifler he was not. When rose- 
leaves it rifles, 
No less than M-hen oak-trees it ruins, 

the wind 
Its pleasure pursues with impetuous 

mind. 
Both Eug?!ue de Luvois and Lord 

Alfred had been 
Men of pleasure: but men's pleasant 

vices, which, seen 
Floating faint, in the sunshine of 

Alfred's soft mood, 
Seemed amiable foibles, by Luvois 

pursued 
With impetuous passion, seemed 

semi-Satanic. 
Half pleased you see brooks play 

with pebbles ; in panic 
Tou watch them whirled down by 

the torrent. 

In truth, 
To the sacred' political creed of his 

youth 
The century which he was born to 

denied 
All realization. Its generous pride 
To degenerate protest on all things 

was sunk ; 
Its principles each to a prejudice 

shrunk. 
Down the path of a life that led no- 
where he trod, 
Where his whims were his guides, 

and his will was his god, 
And his pastime his purpose. 

From boyhood possessed 
Of inherited wealth, he had learned 

to invest 
Both his wealth and those passioas 

wealth frees from the cage 
Which penury locks, in each vice of 

an age. 



All the virtues of which, by the 
creed he revered. 

Were to him illegitimate. 

Thus, he appeared 

To the world what the world chose, 
to have him appear, — 

The frivolous tyrant of Fashion, a 
mere 

Reformer in coats, cards, and car- 
riages ! Still 

'Twas this vigor of natm'e, and ten- 
sion of will, 

That found for the first time — per- 
chance for the last — 

In Lucile what they lacked yet to 
free from the Past, 

Force, and faith, in the Future. 

And so, in his mind. 

To the anguish of losing the woman 
was joined 

The terror of missing his life's des- 
tination. 

Which in her had its mystical repre- 
sentation. 

ni. 
And truly, the thought of it, scaring 

him, passed 
O'er his heart, wliile he now through 

the tnilight rode fast. 
As a shade from the wing of some 

great bird obscene • 
In a wild silent land may be sud- 
denly seen. 
Darkening over the sands, where it 

startles and scares 
Some traveller strayed in the waste 

imawares. 
So that thought more than once 

darkened over his heart 
For a moment, and rapidly seemed 

to depart. 
Fast and furious he rode through the 

thickets which rose 
Up the shaggy hillside ; and the 

quarrelling crows 
Clanged above him, and clustering 

down the dim air 
Dropped into the dark woods. By 

fits here and there 
Shepherd fires faintly gleamed from 

the valleys. O, how 



LUCILE. 



63 



He envied the viingB of each wild 

hird, as now 
He urged the sleed over the dizzy 

ascent 
Of the nioimtains ! Behind him a 

nuirmur was sent 
From tlie torrent, — Before him a 

soimd from the tracts 
0/ the Avoodlands that waved o'er 

the wild cataracts, 
And the loose earth and loose stones 

rolled momently down 
From the hoofs of his steed to abys- 
ses UUknOANTl. 

The red day had fallen beneath the 

black woods, 
And the Powers of tlie night through 

the vast solitudes 
Walked abroad and conversed with 

each other. The trees 
Were in sound and in motion, and 

muttered like seas 
In Elflaiid. The road through the 

forest wa'% hollowed. 
On he sped through the darkness, as 

though he were followed 
Fast, fast by the Erl king ! 

The wild wizard-work 
Of the forest at last opened sharp, 

o'er the fork 
Of a savage ravine, and behind the 

black stems 
Of the last trees, whose leaves in the 

light gleamed like gems, 
Broke the broad moon above the 

vohuninous 
Rock-chaos, — the Hecate of that 

Tartarus ! 
With his horse reeking white, he at 

last reached the door 
Of a small mountain inn, on the 

brow of a hoar 
Craggy promontory, o'er a fissure as 

grim, 
Through which, ever roaring, there 

leaped o'er the limb 
Of the rent rock a torrent of water, 

from sight, 
Into pools tbat were feeding the 

roots of the night. 
A balcony hung o'er the water. 

Above 



In a glimmering casement a shade 
seemed to move. 

At the door the old negress was nod- 
ding her head 

As he reached it. " My mistress 
awaits you," she said. 

And up the rude stairway of creak- 
ing pine rafter 

He followed her silent. A few mo 
ments after. 

His heart almost stimned hun, liis 
head seemed to reel, 

For a door closed — Luvois was aloue 
with Lucile. 



In a gray travelling dress, her dark 

hair unconfined 
Streaming o'er it, and tossed now 

and then by the wind 
From the lattice, that waved the 

dull flame in a spire 
From a brass lamp before her, — a 

faint hectic fire 
On her cheek, to her eyes lent the 

lustre of fever. 
They seemed to have wept them- 
selves wider than ever, 
Those dark eyes, — so dark and so 

deep ! 

" You relent ? 
And your plans have been changed 

by the letter I sent ? " 
There his voice sank, borne down 

by a strong inward strife. 

LuCITvE, 

Your letter ! yes, Didie. For it 

threatens man's life, — 
Woman's honor. 

Luvois. 
The last, madam, not t 

Lucile. 

Both. I glance 
At your own words ; blush, son of 

the knighthood of Fiance, 
As I read tliem I You say in this 
letter . 



64 



LUCILE. 



Why now you refuse me; 'tis {is it 

not so f) 
For the man who has trifled before, 

toantonly, 
And now trifles again with the heart 

you deny 
To myself. But fie shall not ! By 

mail's last wild law, 
I will seize on the rif/ht (the right. 

Due de Luvois !) 
To avenge for you, woman, the past, 

and to give 
To the future its freedom. That 

man shall not live 
To make you as wretched as you 

have made mel" 

Luvois. 
Well, madam, in those words what 

word do you see 
That threatens the honor of woman? 

LuciLE. 

See ! . . . what. 

What word, do you ask? Every 
word ! would you not. 

Had I taken your hand thus, have 
felt that your name 

Was soiled and dishonored by more 
than mere shame 

If the woman that bore it had first 
been the cause 

Of the crime which in these words 
is menaced ? You pause ! 

Woman's honor, you ask ? Is there, 
sir, no dishonor 

In the smile of a Avoman, when men, 
gazing on her, 

Cau shudder, and say, "In that 
smile is a grave?" 

No ! you can have no cause, Duke, 
for no right you have 

In the contest you menace. That 
contest but draws 

Every right into ruin. By all hu- 
man laws 

Of man's heart I forbid it, by all 
sanctities 

Of man's social honor ! 

The Duke drooped his eyes. 

** I obey you," he said, " but let wo- 
man beware 



How she plays fast and loose thus 

with human despair. 
And the storm in man's heart. 

Madam, yours was the riglit, 
When you saw that I hoped, to ex- 
tinguish hope quite. 
But you should from the first have 

done this, for 1 feel 
That you knew from the first that I 

loved you." 

Lucile 
This sudden reproach seemed to 

startle. 

She raised 
A slow, wistful regard to his feat- 
ures, and gazed 
On them silent awhile. His own 

looks were downcast 
Through her heart, whence its first 

wild alarm was now passed. 
Pity crept, and perchance o'er her 

conscience a tear, 
Falling softly, awoke it. 

However severe. 
Were they unjust, these sudden up- 

braidings, to her? 
Had she lightly misconstrued this 

man's character. 
Which had seemed, even when most 

impassioned it seemed, 
Too self-conscious to lose ail in love ? 

Had she deemed 
That this airy, gay, insolent man of 

the world, 
So proud of the place the world gave 

him, held furled 
In his bosom no passion which once 

shaken wide 
Might tug, till it snapped, that erect 

lofty pride ? 
Were those elements in him, which 

once roused to strife 
Overthrow a whole nature, and 

change a whole life ? 
There are two kinds of strength. 

One, the strength of the river 
Which through continents pushes 

its pathway forever 
To fling its fond heart in the sea ; 

if it lose 
This, the aim of its life, it is lost to 

its use. 



LUCILE. 



6S 



It goes mad, is diffused into deluge, 

and dies. 
The other, tlie strength of the sea ; 

which supplies 
Us deep life from mysterious sources, 

and draws 
Tlie river's life into its own life, by 

laws 
Which it heeds not. The difference 

in each case is this : 
The river is lost, if the ocean it 

miss ; 
Jf the sea miss the river, what mat- 
ter ? Tlie sea 
Is the sea still, forever. Its deep 

heart will be 
Self-sufficing, unconscious of loss as 

of yore ; 
Its sources are infinite ; still to the 

shore. 
With no diminution of pride, it will 

say, 
" I am here ; I, the sea ! stand aside, 

and make way ! " 
Was his love, then,' the love of the 

river ? and she, 
Had she taken that love for the love 

of the sea ? 



At that thought, from her aspect 

whatever liad been 
Stern or haughty departed ; and, 

humbled in mien, 
She approached him, and brokenly 

murmured, as though 
To herself more than him, "Was I 

wrong •? is it so ? 
Hear me, Duke ! you must feel that, 

whatever you deem 
Your right to reproach me in this, 

yom esteem 
I may claim on one ground, — I at 

least am sincere. 
You say that to me from the first it 

was clear 
That you loved me. But what if 

this knowledge were known 
At a moiuent in life when I felt most 

alone, 
And least able to be so ? A moment, 

in fact, 



When I strove from one hamiting 

regret to retract 
And emancipate life, and once more 

to fulfil 
Woman's destinies, duties, and 

hopes ? would you still 
So bitterly blame me, Eugene de 

Luvois, 
If I hoped to see all this, or deemed 

that I saw 
For a moment the promise of this, 

in the plighted 
Affection of one Avho, in nature, 

united 
So much that from others affection 

might claim 
If only affection were free ? Do you 

blame 
The hope of that moment? I 

deemed my heart free 
From all, saving sorrow, I deemed 

that in me 
There was yet strength to mould it 

once more to my will, 
To uplift it once more to my hope. 

Do yx)u still 
Blame me, Duke, that I did not then 

bid you refrain 
From hope ? alas ! I too then 

hoped ! " 

Luvois. 

O, again, 

Yet again, say that thrice-blessed 

Avord ! say, Lucile, 
That you then deigned to hope — 

Lucile. 
Yes ! to hope I could feel, 
And could give to you, that without 

wnich, all else given 
Were but to deceive, and to injure 

you even : — 
A heart free from thoughts of anoth- 
er. Say, then, 
Do you blame that one hope ? 

Luvois. 
O Lucile! 

"Say agam,*' 
She resumed, gazing down, and with 
faltering tone, 



66 



LUCILE. 



" Do you blame me that, when I at 

last had to own 
To my heart that the hope it had 

cherislied Mas o'er, 
And forever, I said to you then, 

' Hope no more ? ' 
I myself hoped no more!" 

With but ill-suppressed wrath 
The Duke answered ..." What, 

then ! lie recrosses your path 
This man, and you have but to see 

him, despite 
Of his troth to another, to take back 

that light 
Worthless heart to your own, which 

he wronged years ago!" 
Jjucile faintly, brokenly murmured. 

. . . "No! no! 
'Tls not that — but alas! — but I can- 
not conceal 
That I have not forgotten the past — 

but I feel 
That I cannot accept all these gifts 

on your part, — 
In return for what . . . ah, Duke, 

what is it ? ... a heart 
Which is only a ruin! " 

With words warm and wild, 
" Though a ruin it be, trust me yet 

to rebuild 
And restore it," Luvois cried ; 

" though ruined it be, 
Since so dear is that ruin, ah, yield 

it to me! " 
He approached her. She shrank 

back. The grief in her eyes 
Answered, " No! " 
An emotion more fierce seemed to 

rise 
And to break into flame, as though 

fired by the light 
Of that look, in his heart. He ex- 
claimed, " Am I right ? 
You reject me ! accept lum ? " 

" I have not done so," 
She said fii-mly. He hoarsely re- 
sumed, " Not yet, — no! 
But can you with accents as firm 

promise me 
That you will not accept him ? " 

" Accept ? Is he free ? 
Free to offer ? " she said. 



" You evade me, Lucile," 
He replied; " ah, you will not avow 

what you feel I 
He might make himself free ? O 

you blush, — turn away! 
Dare you openly look in my face 

lady, say ! 
While you deign to reply to one 

question from me ? 
I may hope not, you tell me: but tell 

me, may he ? 
What ! silent V" I alter my question. 

If quite 
Freed in faith from this troth, might 

he hope then?" 

" He might," 
She said softly. 



Those two whispered words, in his 

breast, 
As he heard them, in one maddening 

moment releast 
All that's evil and fierce in man's 

nature, to ci'ush 
And extinguish in man all that's 

good. In the rush 
Of wild jealousy, all the fierce pas- 
sions that waste 
And darken and devastate intellect, 

chased 
From its reahn human reason. The 

wild animal 
In the bosom of man was set free. 

And of all 
Human passions the fiercest, fierce 

jealousy, fierce 
As the fire, and more wild than the 

whirlwind, to pierce 
And to rend, rushed upon him; fierce 

jealousy, swelled 
By all passions bred from it, and 

ever impelled 
To involve all things else in the an- 
guish within it. 
And on others infiict its own pangs! 
At that minute 
What passed through his mind, who 

shall say ? who may tell 
The dark thoughts of man's heart, 

which the red glare of hell 
Can illumine alone ? 



LUCILE. 



67 



He stared wildly around 

That lone place, so lonely! That si- 
lence! no sound 

Reached that room, through the dark 
evening air, save the drear 

Drip and roar of the cataract cease- 
less and near! 

It was midnight all round .on the 
weird silent weather; 

Deep midnight in him! They two, — 
lone and together, 

Himself, and that woman defence- 
less before hiiu! 

The triumph and bliss of his rival 
flashed o'er him. 

The abyss of his own black despair 
seemed to ope 

At his feet, with that awful exclu- 
sion of hope 

Which Dante read over the city of 
doom. 

All the Tarquin passed into his soul 
in the gloom, 

•And, uttering words he dared never 
recall. 

Words of insult and menace, he 
thundered down all 

The brewed storm-cloud within him: 
its flashes scorched blind 

His own senses. His spirit was 
driven on the wind 

Of a reckless emotion beyond his 
control; 

A torrent seemed loosened within 
him. His soul 

Surged up from that caldron of pas- 
sion that hissed 

And seethed in his heart. 



He had thrown, and had missed 
His last stake. 



For, transfigured, she rose from 

the place 
Where he rested o'erawed: a saint's 

scorn on her face ; 
Such a dread vade retro was written 

in light 
On her forehead, the fiend would 

himself, at that sight, 



Have sunk back abashed to perdi- 
tion. I know 

If Lucretia at Tarquin but once had 
looked so. 

She had needed no dagger next 
morning. 

She rose 

And swept to the door, like that 
phantom the snows 

Feel at nightfall sweep o'er them, 
when daylight is gone. 

And Caucasus is with the moon all 
alone. 

There she paused ; and, as though 
from immeasurable, 

Insurpassable distance, she mur- 
mured — 

"Farewell! 

We, alas ! have mistaken each other. 
Once more 

Illusion, to-night, in my lifetime is 
o'er. 

Due de Luvois, adieu!" 

From the heart-breaking gloom 

Of that vacant, reproachful, and des- 
olate room. 

He felt she was gone, — gone forever j 

IX. 

No word. 

The sharpest that ever was edged by 
a sword. 

Could have pierced to his heart with 
such keen accusation 

As the silence, the sudden profound 
isolation, 

In which he remained. 

"O, return; I repent!" 

He exclaimed ; but no sound through 
the stillness was sent, 

Save the roar of the water, in an- 
swer to him. 

And the beetle that, sleeping, yet 
hummed her night-hymn : 

An indistinct anthem, that ti'oubled 
the air 

With a searching, and wistful, and 
questioning prayer. 

"Eetui-n," sung the wandering in- 
sect. The roar 

Of the waters replied, "Nevermore ! 
nevermore I" 






68 



LUCILE. 



He walkod to the window. The 
spray on his brow 

Was flung cold from the whirlpools 
of water below ; 

The frail wooden balcony shook in 
the sound 

Of the torrent. The mountains 
gloomed sullenly round 

A canclle one ray from a closed case- 
ment flung. 

O'er the dim balustrade all bewil- 
dered he hung, 

Vaguely watching the broken and 
shimmering blink 

Of the stars on the veering and vitre- 
ous brink 

Of that snake-like prone column of 
water; and listing 

Aloof o'er the languors of air the per- 
sisting 

ShariJ horn of the gray gnat. Before 
he relinquished 

His unconscious employment, that 
light was extinguished. 

Wheels, at last, from the inn door 
aroused him. He ran 

Down the stairs ; reached the door — 
just to see her depart. 

Down the moimtain the carriage was 
speeding. 



X. 

His heart 
Pealed the knell of its last hope. He 

rushed on ; but whither 
He knew not — on, into the dark 

cloudy weather — 
The midnight— the mountains— on, 

over the shelf 
Of the precipice— on, still — away 

from himself! 
Till, exhausted, he sank 'mid the 

dead leaves and moss 
At the mouth of the forest. A glim- 
mering cross 
Of gray stone stood for prayer by the 

woodsidc. lie sank 
Prayerless, powerless, down at its 

base, 'mid the dank 
Weeds and grasses; his face hid 

amongst thom. He knew 



That the night had divided his wholu 
life in two. 

Behind him a Past that was over for- 
ever-, [deavor 

Before him a Future devoid of en- 

And purpose. He felt a remorse for 
the one. 

Of the other a fear. What remained 
to be done ? 

Whither now should he turn ? Turn 
again, as before. 

To his old easy, careless existence of 
yore 

He could not. He felt that for bet- 
ter or worse 

A change had passed o'er him; an 
angry remorse 

Of his own frantic failure and error 
liad marred 

Such a refuge forever. The future 
seemed barred 

By the corpse of a dead hope o'er 
which he must tread 

To attain it. Jjife's wilderness round 
him was spread. 

What clew there to cling by ? 

He clung by a name 

To a dynasty fallen forever. He came 

O^ an old princely house, true 
through change to the race 

And the sword of Saint Louis, — a 
faith 'twere disgrace 

To relinquish, and folly to live for! 
Nor less 

Was his ancient religion (once potent 
to bless 

Or to ban ; and the crozier his ances- 
tors kneeled 

To adore, when they fought f(n' the 
Cross, in hard field. 

With the Crescent) become ere it 
reached him, tradition; 

A mere faded badge of a social posi- 
tion ; 

A thing to retain and say nothing 
aboiit. 

Lest, if used, it should draw degrada- 
tion from doubt. 

Thus., the first time he sought them, 
the creeds of his youth 

Wholly failed the strong needs of his 
manhood, in truth I 



LUCILE. 



69 



And beyond them, what region of 

refuge ? what field 
For employment, this civilized age, 

did it yield, 
In that civilized land ? or to thought ? 

or to action ? 
Blind deliriums, bewildered and end- 
less distraction ! 
Not even a desert, not even the cell 
Of a hermit to flee to, wherein he 

might quell 
The wild devil-instincts which now, 

unreprest, 
Run riot through that ruined "world 

in his breast. 



So he lay there, like Lucifer, fresh 
from the sight 

Of a heaven scaled and lost; in the 
wide arms of night 

O'er the howling abysses of nothing- 
ness ! There 

As he lay, Nature's deep voice was 
teaching him prayer; 

But what had he to pray to ? 

The winds in the woods 

The voices abroad o'er those vast 
solitudes, 

Were in commune all roimd with the 
invisible PoAver 

That walked the dim world by Him- 
self at that hour. 

But their language he had not yet 
learned — in despite 

Of the much he had learned — or for- 
gotten it quite. 

With its once native accents. Alas! 
what had he 

To add to that deep-toned sublime 
symphony 

Of thanksgiving ? . . . A fiery-finger 
was still 

Scorching into his heart some dread 
sentence. His will, 

Like a wind that is put to no purpose, 
was wild 

At its work of destruction within 
him. The child 

Of an infidel age, he had been his 
own god, 

His own devil. 



He sat on the damp moimtain sod, 

And stared sullenly up at the dark 
sky. 

The clouds 

Had heaped themselves over the 
bare west in crowds 

Of misshapen, incongruous portents. 
A green 

Streak of dreary, cold, luminous 
ether, between 

The base of their black barricades, 
and the ridge 

Of the grim world, gleamed ghasily, 
as luider some bridge. 

Cyclop-sized, in a city of ruins over- 
thrown 

By sieges forgotten, some river, un- 
known 

And unnamed, widens on into deso- 
late lands 

While he gazed, that cloud-city in- 
visible hands 

Dismantled and rent; and revealed, 
through a loop 

In the breached dark, the blemished 
and half-broken hoop 

Of the moon, which soon silently 
sank; and anon 

The whole supernatural pageant was 
- gone. 

The wide night, discomforted, con- 
scious of loss. 

Darkened round him. One object 
alone — that gray cross — 

Glimmered faint on the dark. Gaz- 
ing up, he descried 

Through the void air, its desolate 
arms outstretched widt. 

As though to embrace him. 

He turned from the sight, 

Set his face to the darkness, and tied. 

XII, 

When the light 
Of the dawn grayly flickered and 

glared on the spent 
Wearied ends of the night, like a 

hope that is sent 
To the need of some grief when its 

need is the sorest. 
He Avas sullenly riding across the 

dark forest 



70 



lUCILE, 



Towards Serclion. 

Thus riding, with eyes of defiance 
Set against the young day, as dis- 
claiming alliance 
With aught that the day brings to 

man, he perceived 
Faintly, suddenly, fleetingly, through 

the damp-leaved 
Autumn branches that put forth 

gaunt arms on his way, 
The face of a man pale and wistful, 

and gray 
With the gray glare of morning. 

Eugene de Luvois, 
With the sense of a strange second 

sight, when he saw 
That phantom-like face, could at 

once recognize. 
By the sole instinct now left to guide 

him, the eyes 
Of his rival, though fleeting the 

vision and dim, 
With a stern sad inquiry lixed keen- 
ly on him. 
And, to meet it, a lie leaped at once 

to his own ; 
A lie born of that lying darkness now 

grown 
Over all in his nature ! He answered 

that gaze 
With a look which, if ever a man's 

look conveys 
More intensely than words what a 

man means, conveyed 
Beyond doubt in its smile an an- 
nouncement Avhich said, 
" 7 have triumphed. The question 

your eyes loould imply 
Comes too late, Alfred Vargrave ! " 
And so he rode by. 
And I'ode on, and rode gayly, and 

rode out of sight. 
Leaving that look behind him to 

rankle and bite. 

XIII. 

And it bit, and it rankled. 

XIV. 

lionl Alfred, scarce knowing. 
Or choosing, or heeding the way he 
was going, 



By one wild hope impelled, by one 

wild fear pursued. 
And led by one instinct, which seem- 
ed to exclude 
From his inhid every human sensa- 
tion, save one — 
The torture of doubt — had strayed 

moodily on, 
Down the highway deserted, that 

evening in which 
With the Duke he had parted ; 

strayed on, through the rich 
Haze of sunset, or into the gradual 

night, 
Which darkened, unnoticed, the 

land from his sight. 
Toward Saint Saviour ; nor did the 

changed aspect of all 
The wild scenery round him avail to 

recall • (tions, until, 

To his senses their normal percep- 
As he stood on the black shaggy 

brow of the hill 
At the mouth of the forest, the 

moon, which had hung 
Two dark hours in a cloud, slipped 

on fire from among 
The rent vapors, and sunk o'er the 

ridge of the world. 
Then he lifted his eyes, and saw 

round him unfurled. 
In one moment of splendor, the 

leagues of dark trees. 
And the long rocky line of the wild 

Pyrenees. 
And he knew by the milestone scored 

rough on the face 
Of the bare rock, he was but two 

hours from the place 
Where Lucile and Luvois must have 

met. This same track 
The Duke must have traversed, per- 
force, to get back 
To Serchon ; not yet then the Duke 

had returned ! 
He listened, he looked up the dark, 

but discerned 
Not a trace, not a sound of a horse 

by the way. 
He knew that the night was ap- 
proaching to day. 



He resolved to proceed to Saint 
Saviour. The morn 

Which, at last, through the forest 
broke chill and forlorn, 

Revealed to liiui, riding toward Ser- 

chon, the Duke. 
Twas then that the two men ex- 
changed look for look. 
XV. 

And the Duke's rankled in him. 

XVI. 

He rushed on. He tore 
His path through the thicket. He 

reached the inn door, 
Eoused the yet drowsing porter, re- 
luctant to rise, 
And inquired for the Countess. The 

man rubbed his ej-es. 
The Countess was gone. And the 

Duke ? 

The man stared 
A sleepy inquiry. 

With accents that scared 
The man's dull sense awake, "He, 

the stranger," he cried, 
"Who had been there that night ! " 

The man grinned and replied, 
With a vacant intelligence, " He, O 

ay, ay! 
He went after the lady." 

No further reply 
Could he give. Alfred Vargrave de- 
manded no more. 
Flung a coin to the man, and so 

turned from the door. 
"What! the Duke then the night in 

that lone inn had passed ? 
In that lone inn — with her! " Was 

that look he had cast 
When they met in the forest, that 

look which remained 
On his mind with its terrible smile, 

thus explained ? 

XVII. 

The da,y was half tiu-ned to the even- 
ing, before 

He re-entered Serchon, with a heart 
sick and sore. 

! :i the midst of a light crowd of bab- 
blers, his look, 



By their voices attracted, distinguish- 
ed the Duke, 

Gay, insolent, noisy, with eyes spark- 
ling bright, [ous. 

With laughter, shrill, airy, continu- 

Right 

Through the throng Alfred Var- 
grave, with swift sombre 

stride. 

Glided on. The Duke noticed him, 
turned, stepped aside. 

And, C(,)rdially grasping his hand, 
whispered low, 

" O, how right have you been I 
There can never be — no, 

Never — any more contest between 
us! Milord, 

Let us henceforth be friends ! " 

Having uttered that word, 

He turned lightly round on his heel, 
and again 

His gay laughter was heard, echoed 
loud by that train 

Of his young imitators. 

Lord Alfred stood still. 

Rooted, stunned to the spot. He 
felt weary and ill, 

Out of heart with his own heart, and 
sick to the soul. 

With a dull, stifling anguish he could 
not control. 

Does he hear in a dream, through 
the buzz of the crowd. 

The Duke's blithe associates, bab- 
bling aloud 

Some comment upon his gay humor 
that day ? 

He, never was gayer: what makes 
him so gay ? 

'Tis, no doubt, say the flatterers, 
flattering in tune, 

Some vestal whose virtue no tongue 
dare impugn 

Has at last found a Mars, — who, of 
course, shall be nameless. 

The vestal that yields to Mars onl;, 
is blameless ! 

Hark! hears he a name which, thus 
syllabled, stirs 

All bis heart into tumult ? . . . Ln- 
cile de Ncvers 



73 



LUCILE. 



With the Duke's coupled gayly, in 

some laughing, light, 
Free allusion ? Jsiot so as might 

give him the right 
To turn fiercely round on the 

speaker, hut yet 
To a trite and irreverent compliment 

set ! 

XVIII. 

Slowly, slowly, usurping that jjlace 

in his soxil 
Where the thought of Lucile was 

enshrined, did there roll 
Back again, back again, on its 

smooth downwaid course 
O'er his nature, with galhered mo- 

mentimi and force, 
The wokld. 

XIX. 

"No!" he inuttered, "she cannot 

have sinned ! 
True! women there are (self-named 

women of mind ! ) 
Who love rather liberty — liberty, 

yes ! 
To choose and to leave — than the 

legalized stress 
Of the lovingest marriage. But she 

— is she so '? 
I will not believe it, Lucile ? O no, 

no ! 
Not Lucile ! 
'•But the world? and, ah, what 

would it say "? 
O the look of that man, and his 

laughter, to-day ! 
Tlie gossip's light question ! the 

slanderous jest ! 
She is i-ight ! no, we could not he 

happy. 'Tis best 
As it is. 1 will write to her, — write, 

O my lieart ! 
And accept her farewell. Our fare- 
well ! nuist we part, — 
Part thus, then, — forever, Lucile ? 

Is it so? 
Yes ! I feel it. We could not be 

happy, I know. 
'Twas a dream ! we must waken 1 " 



With head bowed, as though 

By the weight of the heart's resigna- 
tion, and slow 

Moody footsteps, he turned to his 
inn. 

Drawn apart 

From the gate, in the court-yard, 
and ready to start, 

Postboys mounted, portmanteaus 
packed up and made fast, 

A travelling-carriage, imnoticed, he 
passed. 

He ordered his horse to be ready 
anon : 

Sent, and paid, for the reckoliing, 
and slowly passed on. 

And ascended the staircase, and en- 
tered his room. 

It was twilight. The chamber was 
dark in the gloom 

Of the evening. He listlessly kindled 
a light 

On the mantel-piece; there a large 
card caught his sight, — 

A large card, a stout card, well print- 
ed and plain, 

Nothing flourishing, flimsy, affected, 
or vain. 

It gave a respectable look to the slab 

That it lay oji. The name was — 



Sir BiDLEY MacNab. 



Full familiar to him was the name 
that he saw. 

For 'twas that of his OAvn future 
uncle-in-law, 

Mrs. Darcy's rich brother, the bank- 
er, well-known 

As wearing the longest-phylacteried 
gown 

Of all the rich Pharisees England 
can boast of; 

A shrewd Puritan Scot, whose sharp 
wits made the most of 



LUCILE. 



73 



This TTorld and the next ; having 
largely invested 

Not only where treasure is never 
molested 

By thieves, moth, or rust; but on this 
eartlily ball 

"Where interest was high, and secur- 
ity small, 

Of mankind there was never a theory 
yet 

Not by some individual instance up- 
set: 

And so to that sorrowful verse of the 
Psalm 

Wliich declares that the wicked ex- 
pand like tlie palm 

In a world where the righteous are 
stunted and pent, 

A cheering exception did Ridley pre- 
sent. 

Like the worthy of Uz, Heaven pros- 
pered his piety. 

The leader of every religious society. 

Christian knowledge he labored 
through life to promote 

With personal profit, and knew hoAv 
to quote 

Both the Stocks and the Scri]5ture, 
with equal advantage 

To himself and admiiing friends, in 
this Cant-xVcre. 



Wliilst over this card Alfred vacantly 
brooded, 

A waiter his head through the door- 
way j)rotruded ; 

"Sir Ridley MacNab with Milord 
wished to speak." 

Alfred Vargrave . could feel there 
were tears on his cheek: 

He brushed them away with a ges- 
ture cf pride. 

He glanced at the glass; when his 
own face he eyed, 

He was scared by its pallor. Inclin- 
ing his head. 

He with tones calm, unshaken, and 
silvery, said, 
Sir Ridley may enter." 

Jn three minutes more 



That benign apparition appeared at 
the door. 

Sir Ridley, released for a while from 
the cares 

Of business, -and minded to breathe 
the pure airs 

Of the blue Pyrenees, and enjoy his 
release. 

In company there with his sister and 
niece. 

Found himself now at Serchon, — dis- 
tributing tracts. 

Sowing seed by the way, and collect- 
ing new facts 

For Exeter Hall ; he was starting 
that night 

For Bigorre : he had heard, to his 
cordial delight, 

Tliat Lord Alfred was there, and, 
himself, setting out 

For the same destination: impatient, 
no doubt ! 

Here some commonplace compli- 
ments as to "the marriage" 

Through his speech trickled softly, 
like honey: his carriage 

Was ready. A storm seemed to 
threaten the weather: 

If his young friend agreed, why not 
travel together ? 

With a footstep imcertain and rest- 
less, a frown 

Of perplexity, during this speech, 
up and down 

Alfred Vargrave was striding ; but, 
after a pause 

And a slight hesitation, the which 
seemed to cause 

Some surprise to Sir Ridley, he an- 
swered, — "My dear 

Sir Ridley, allow me a few moments 
here — 

Half an hour at the most — to con- 
clude an affair 

Of a nature so urgent as hardly to 
spare 

My presence (which brought me, in- 
deed, to this spot). 

Before I accept your kind offer." 

"AVhynot?' 



74 



LUCILE. 



Said Sir Ridley, and smiled. Alfred 

Vargrave, before 
Sir Ridley observed it, had passed 

through the door. 
A few moments later, with footsteps 

revealing- 
Intense agitation of imcontrolled 

feeling, [low. 

He was rapidly pacing the garden be- 
What passed through his mind then 

is more than I Ivuow, 
But before one half-hour into dark- 
ness had fled. 
In the court-yard he stood with Sir 

Ridley. His tread 
Was firm and composed. Not a sign 

on his face 
Betrayed there the least agitation. 

" The place 
Ton so kindly have offered," he said, 

" I accept." 
And he stretched out his hand. The 

two travellers stepped 
Smiling into the carriage. 

And thus, out of sight, 
They drove down the dai'k road, and 

into the night. 



Sir Ridley was one of those wise men 
who, so far 

4-3 their power of saying it goes, say 
with /ophar, 

" We, no doubt, are the people, and 
wisdom shall die with us ! " 

Though of wisdom like theirs there 
is no small supply with us. 

Side by side in the carriage en- 
sconced, the two men 

Began to converse, somewhat drow- 
sily, when 

Alfred suddenly thought, — " Here's 
a man of ripe age. 

At my side, by his fellows repi\,ted 
as sage, 

Who looks happy, and therefore who 
must have been wise: 

Suppose I with caution reveal to his 
eyes 

Some few of the reasons which make 
me believe 



That I neither am happy nor wise ? 

'twould relieve 
And enlighten, perchance, my own 

darkness and doubt." 
For which purpose a feeler he softly 

put out. 
It was snapped up at once. 

"What is truth?" jesting Pil- 
ate 
Asked, and passed. from the question 

at once with a smile at 
Its utter futility. Had he addressed 

it 
To Ridley MaclSTab, he at least had 

confessed it 
Admitted discussion! and certainly 

no man 
Could more promptly have answei-ed 

the skeptical Roman 
Than Ridley. Hear some street as- 
tronomer talk! 
Grant him two or three hearers, a 

morsel of chalk. 
And forthwith on the pavement he'll 

sketch you the scheme 
Of the heavens. Then hear him en- 
large on his theme ! 
Not afraid of La Place, nor of Arago, 

he ! 
He'll prove you the whole plan in 

plain ABC. 
Here's your sun, — call him A ; b's 

the moon ; it is clear 
How the rest of the alphabet brings 

up the rear 
Of the planets. Now ask Arago, ask 

La Place, 
(Your sages, who speak with the 

heavens face to face !) 
Their science in plain A b c to ac- 
cord 
To your point-blank inquiry, my 

friends ! not a word 
Will you get for your pains from 

their sad lips. Alas ! 
Not a drop from the bottle that's 

quite full will pass. 
'Tis the half-empty vessel that freest 

emits 
The water that's in it. 'Tis thus 

with men's wits ; 



^ 



LUCILE. 



75 



Or at least with their knowledge. A 

man's capability 

Of imparting to others a truth with 
facility (exactness 

Is proportioned forever with painful 

To the portable nature, the vuJgar 
compactness, 

The minuteness in size, or the light- 
ness in weight 

Of tlie truth he imparts. So small 
coins circulate 

More freely than large ones. A beg- 
gar asks alms, 

And Ave fling him a sixpence, nor 
feel any qualms ; 

But if every street charity shook an 
investment, 

Or each beggar to clothe we must 
strip off a vestment, 

The length of the process would 
limit the act ; 

And therefore the truth that's sum- 
med up in a tract 

Is most lightly dispensed. 

As for Alfred, indeed, 

On what spoonfuls of truth lie was 
suffered to feed 

By Sir Ilidley, I know not. This 
only I know, 

That the two men thus talking con- 
tinued to go 

Onward somehow, together, — on 
into tbe night, — 

The midnight, — in which they es- 
cape from our sight. 



And meanwhile a world had been 

changed in its place, 
And those glittering chains that o'er 

blue balmy space 
Hang the blessing of darkness, had 

drawn out of sight, 
To solace unseen hemispheres, the 

soft night ; 
And the dew of the dayspring be- 
nignly descended, 
And the fair morn to all things new 

sanction extended, 
In the smile of the East. And the 

lark soaring on, 



Lost in light, shook the dawn with 
a song from the sim. 

And the world laughed. 

It wanted but two rosy hours 

From the noon, when they passed 
through the thick passion- 
flowers 

Of the little wild garden that dim- 
pled before 

The small house where their car- 
riage now stopped, at Bigorre. 

And more fair than the flowers, 
more fresh than the dew, 

With her white mornhig robe flitting 
joyously through 

The dark shrubs with which the soft 
hillside was clothed, 

Alfred Vargrave perceived, where he 
paused, his betrothed. 

Matilda sprang to him, at once, with 
a face 

Of such sunny sweetness, such glad- 
ness, such grace. 

And radiant confidence, childlike 
delight, 

That his whole heart upbraided it- 
self at that sight. 

And he murmured, or sighed, " O, 
how could I have strayed 

From this sweet child, or suffered in 
aught to invade 

Her young claim on my life, though 
it were for an hour, 

The thought of another ? " 

" Look up, my sweet flower ! " 

He whispered her softly, " my heart 
unto thee 

Is returned, as retm-ns to the rose 
the wild bee !" 

"And will wander no more?" 
laughed Matilda. 
"No more " 

He repeated. And, low to himself, 
"Yes, 'tis o'er ! 

My course, too, is decided, Lucile ! 
Was I blind 

To have dreamed that these clever 
Frenchwomen of mind 

Could satisfy simply a plain English 
heart, 

Or sympathize with it ? " 



xxrv. 
And here the first part 
Of this drama is over. The cmtain 

falls furled 
On the actors within it, — the Heart 

and the World. 
Wooed and wooer haye played with 

tlie riddle of life, 
Have they solved it ? 
Appear ! answer. Husband and 
Wife ! 

XXV. 

Yet, ere bidding farewell to Lucile 

de Nevers, 
Bear lier own heart's farewell in this 

letter of hers. 

The CoMTESSE DE Nevers to a 

Friend in India. 
" Once more, O my friend, to your 

amis and your heart, 
And the places of old . . . never, 

never to part ! 
Once more to the palm and the foun- 
tain ! Once more 
To the land of my birth, and the 

deep skies of yore ! 
From the cities of Europe, i^ursued 

by the fret 
Of their tm-moil wherever my foot- 
steps are set ; 
From the children that cry for the 

birth, and behold, 
There is no strength to bear them, 

— old Time is so old ! 
From tlie world's weary masters, 

that come upon earth 
Sapped and mined by the fever they 

bear from their birth ; 
From the men of small stature, mere 

parts of a crowd, 
Born too late, when the strength of 

the world hath been bowed ; 
Jiack, — back to the Oi'ient, from 

wliose sunbright womb 
Sprang the giants wliicli now are no 

more, in the bloom 
And the beauty of times that are 

faded forever ! 
To the palms ! to tlie tombs ! to the 

still Saci'ed River ! 



Where I too, the child of a day that 
_ is done. 

First "leapt into life, and looked up 
at the sun. 

Back again, back again, to the hill- 
tops of home 

I come, O my friend, my consoler, I 
come ! 

Are the three intense stars, that we 
watched night by night 

Burning broad on the band of Orion, 
as bright ? 

Are tlie large Indian moons as se- 
rene as of old, 

When, as cliildren, we gathered the 
moon beans for gold ? 

Do you yet recollect me, my friend ? 
Do you still 

Eemember the free games we played 
on the hill, 

'Mid those liuge stones upheaped, 
where we recklessly trod 

O'er the old ruined fane of the old 
ruined god ? 

How lie frowned, while around him 
we carelessly played ! 

That frown on my life ever after 
hath stayed, 

Like the shade of a solemn experi- 
ence upcast 

From some vague supernatiu-al grief 
in the past. 

For the poor god, in pain, more than 
anger, he frowned. 

To perceive that our youth, though 
so fleeting, had found, 

In its transient and ignorant glad- 
ness, the bliss 

Which his science divine seemed di- 
vinely to miss. 

Alas ! you may haply remember me 
yet 

The free child, whose glad childhood 
myself I forget. 

I come — a sad woman, defrauded of 
rest : 

I bear to you only a laboring breast : 

My lie in is a storm-beaten ark, 
wildly hurled 

O'er the whirlpools of time, with the 
wrecks of a world : 



-l:x. 



The dove from my bosom hath flown 

far away ; 
It is flown, and returns not, though 

many a day 
Have I watched from the whidows 

of Ufe for its coming. 
Friend, I sigh for repose, I am 

weary of roaming. 
I l^now not what Ararat rises for me 
Far away, o'er the waves of the 

wandering sea : 
I know not wliat rainbow may yet, 

from far hills, [tionofills: 
Lift the promise of hope, the cessa- 
But a voice, like the voice of my 

youth, in my breast 
Wakes and whispers me on — to the 

East ! to the East ! 
Shall I find' the child's heart that I 

left there ? or find 
The lost youth I recall with its pure 

peace of mind ? 
Alas I who shall number the drops 

of the rain ? 
Or give to the dead leaves tlieir 

greenness again ? 
Who sliall seal up the caverns the 

earthquake hath rent ? 
Who shall bring forth the winds tliat 

within them are pent ? 
To a voice who shall render an im- 
age ? or who 
From the heats of the noontide shall 

gather the dew ? 
I have biu-iied out within me the 

fuel of life 
Wherefore lingers the flame ? Rest 

is sweet after strife. 
I would sleep for a while. I am 

weary. 

" My friend, 
I had meant in these lines to re- 
gather, and send 
To our old home, my life's scattered 

links. But 'tis vain I 
Each attempt seems to shatter the 

chaplet again ; 
Only fit now for fingers like mine to 

run o'er, 
Who return, a recluse, to those 

cloisters of yore 



Whence too far I have wandered. 

" How many long years 
Does it seem to me now since the 

quick, scorching tears, 
While I wrote to you, splashed out a 

girl's premature 
Moans of pain at what women in si- 
lence endure ! 
To your eyes, friend of mine, and to 

your eyes alone, 
That now long-faded page of my life 

hath been shown 
Which recorded my heart's birth, 

and death, as you know. 
Many years since, — how many ! 

"A few months ago 
I seemed reading it backward, that 

page ! Why explain 
Whence or how ? The old dream of 

my life rose again. 
The old superstition ! the idol of old ! 
It is over. The leaf trodden down 

in the mould 
Is not to the forest more lost than to 

me 
Tliat emotion. I bury it here by tlie 

sea 
Wliicli will bear me anon far away 

from the shore 
Of a land which my footsteps shall 

visit no more. 
And a heart's reqidcscat I write on 

that grave. 
Hark! the sigh of the wind, and the 

sound of the .wave, 
Seem like voices of spirits that wliis- 

per me home I 
I come, O you whispering voices, I 

come 1 
My friend, ask me nothing. 

" Receive me alone 
As a Santon receives to his dwelling 

of stone 
In silence some pilgrim the midnight 

may bring : 
It may be an angel that, weary of 

wing. 
Hath paused in his flight fi'om somo 

city of doom, 
Or only a wayfarer strayed in the 

gloom. 






This only I know : that in Europe at 

least 
Lives the craft or the power that 

must master our East. 
Wherefore strive where the gods 

must themselves yield at last? 
Both they and their altars pass by 

with the Past. 
The gods of the household Time 

thrusts from the shelf ; 
And I seem as unreal and weird to 

myself 
As those idols of old. 



" Other times, other men, 
Other men, other passions ! 

"So be it ! yet again 
I turn to my birthplace, the birth- 
place of morn , 
And the light of those lands where 

the great sim is born ! 
Spread your arms, O, my friend ! on 

your breast let me feel 
The repose which hath fled from mj 
own. 

"Your LuciLE." 



PART II. 



CANTO I. 



Hail, Muse ! But each Muse by this 

time has, I know. 
Been used up, and Apollo has bent 

his own bow 
All too long; so I leave unassaulted 

the portal 
Of Olympus, and only invoke here a 

mortal. 

Hail, Murray ! — not Lindley, — but 

Murray and Son. 
Hail, omniscient, beneficent, great 

Two-in-One ! 
In Albemarle Street may thy temple 

long stand ! 
Long enlightened and led by thine 

erudite hand. 
May each novice in science nomadic 

imravel 
Statistical mazes of modernized 

travel ! 
May each inn-keeping knave long 

thy judgments revere, 
And the postboys of Europe regard 

thee with fear ; 
While they feel, in the silence of 

baffled extortion. 
That knowledge is power ! Long, 

long, like that portion 



Of the national soil which the Greek 

exile took 
In his baggage wherever he went, 

may tliy book 
Cheer each poor British pilgrim, who 

trusts to thy wit 
Not to pay through his nose just for 

folloM'ing it ! 
Mayst thou long, O instructor ! pre- 
side o'er his way. 
And teach him alike what to praise 

and to pay ! 
Thee, pursuing this pathway of song, 

once again 
I invoke, lest, unskilled, I should 

wander in vain. 
To my call be propitious, nor, churl- 
ish, refuse 
Thy great accents to lend to the lips 

of my Muse ; 
For I sing of the Naiads who dwell 

'mid the stems 
Of the green linden-trees by the 

waters of Ems. 
Yes! thy spirit descends upon mine, 

O, Jolm Murray ! 
And I start — with thy book — for the 

Baths in a hurry. 
II. 
"At Coblentz a bridge of boats 

crosses the Rhine ; 
And from thence the road, winding 

by Ehrenbreitstein, 



LUCILE. 



79 



Passes over the frontier of Nassau. 
("N. B. 

No custom-house here since the Zoll- 
verein." See 

Murray, paragraph 30. ) 

"The route, at each turn, 

Here the lover of natiu-e allows to 
discern, 

In varying prospect, a rich wooded 
dale : 

The vine and acacia-tree mostly pre- 
vail 

In the foliage observable here ; and, 
moreover, 

The soil is carbonic. The road, un- 
der cover 

Of the grape-clad and mountainous 
upland that hems 

Eound this beautiful spot, brings the 
traveller to— "EMS. 

A schnellpost from Frankfort arrives 
every day. 

At the Km-haus (the old Ducal man- 
sion) you pay 

Eight florins for lodgings. A Restau- 
rateur 

Is attached to the place ; but most 
travellers prefer 

(Including, indeed, many persons of 
note) [d'hote. 

To dine at the usual-priced table 

Through the town runs the Lahn, the 
steep green banks of which 

Two rows of white picturesque 
houses enrich ; 

And between the high road and the 
river is laid 

Out a sort of a garden, called ' The 
Promenade.' 

Female visitors here, who may make 
up their mind 

To ascend to the top of these moun- 
tains, will find 

Oil the banks of the stream, saddled 
all the day long. 

Troops of donkeys — sure-footed — 
I)roverbially strong ; " 

And the traveller at Ems may re- 
mark, as he passes, 

Here, as elsewhere, the women run 
after the asses. 



'Mid the world's weary denizens 

bound for these springs 
In the month when the merle on tbe 

maiJle-bough sings. 
Pursued to the place from dissimilar 

paths [the baths 

By a similar sickness, there came to 
Four sufferers, — each stricken deep 

through the heart, 
Or the head, by the " self-same in- 
visible dart 
Of the arrow that flieth unheard in 

the noon, 
From the sickness that walketh un- 
seen in the moon, 
Through this great lazaretto of life, 

wherein each 
Infects with his own sores the next 

within reach. 
First of these were a young English 

husband and wife, 
Grown weary ere half through the 

journey of life. 
O Nature, say where, thou gray 

mother of earth. 
Is the strength of thy youth ? that 

thy womb brings to birth 
Only old men to-day ! On the winds, 

as of old, [bold ; 

Thy voice in its accent is joyous and 
Thy forests are green as of yore ; and 

thine oceans 
Yet move in the might of their 

ancient emotions : 
But man — thy last birtli and thy 

best — is no more 
Life's free lord, that looked up to 

the starlight of yore. 
With the faith on the brow, and the 

tire in the eyes. 
The firm foot on the earth, the high 

heart in the skies ; 
But a gray-headed infant, defrauded 

of youth, 
Born too late or too early. 

The lady, in truth, 
Was young, fair, and gentle ; and 

never was given 
To more heavenly eyes, the pure 

azm'e of heaven. 



8o 



LUCILE. 



Never yet did the sun touch to rip- 
ples of gold 
Tresses brighter than those which 

her soft hand unrolled 
From her noble and innocent brow, 

when she I'ose, 
An Aurora, at dawn, from her balmy 

repose. 
And into the mirror the bloom and 

the blush 
Of her beauty broke, glowing ; like 

light in a gush 
From the sunrise in summer. 

Love, roaming, shall meet 
But rarely a nature more sound or 

more sweet — 
Eyes brighter — brows whiter — a 

figure more fair — 
Or lovelier lengths of more radiant 

hair — 
Than thine. Lady Alfred ! And 

here I aver 
(May those that have seen thee de- 
clare if I err) 
That not all the oysters in Britain 

contain 
A pearl pure as thou art. 

Let some one explain, — 
Who may know more than 1 of the 

intimate life 
Of the pearl with the oyster, — why 

yet in his M'ife, 
In despite of her beauty — and most 

when he felt 
His soul to the sense of her loveli- 
ness melt — 
Lord Alfred missed something he 

sought for : indeed, 
The more that he missed it the 

greater the need ; 
Till it seemed to himself he could 

willingly spare 
All the charms that he found for the 

one charm not there. 

IV. 

For the blessings Life lends us, it 

strictly demands 
The worth of their full usufruct at 

our hands. 
And the value of all things exists, 

not indeed 



In themselves, but man's use of 
them, feeding man's need. 

Alfred Vargrave, in wedding with 
beauty and youth, 

Had embraced both Ambition aiU 
Wealth. Yet in truth 

Unfulfilled the ambition, and stei-ile 
the wealth 

(In a life paralyzed by a moral ill- 
health), 

Had remained, while the beauty and 
youth, unredeemed 

From a vague disappointment at all 
things, but seemed 

Day by day to reproach him in silence l 
for all . [ 

That lost youth in himself they had ' 
failed to recall. 

No career had lie followed, no object 
obtained 

In the world by those worldl-y ad- 
vantages gained 

From nuptials beyond which once 
seemed to appear. 

Lit by love, the broad path of a bril- 
liant career. 

All that glittered and gleamed 
through.the moonlight of youth 

With a glory so fair, now that man- 
hood in truth 

Grasped and gathered it, seemed like 
that false fairy gold 

Which leaves in the hand only moss, 
leaves, and mould ! 

V. 

Fairy gold! moss and leaves! and the 

young Fairy Bride ? 
Lived there yet fairy-lands in the face 

at his side '? 
Say, O friend, if at evening thou ever 

hast watched 
Some pale aiid impalpable vapor, de- 
tached 
From the dim and disconsolate earth, 

rise and fall 
O'er the light of a sweet serene star, 

until all 
The chilled splendor reluctantly 

waned in the deep 
Of its own native heaven ? Even so 

seemed to creep 



LUCILE. 



O'er that fair and ethereal face, day 
by day, 

Wliile the radiant vermeil, suhsiding 
away, 

Hid its light in the heart, the faint 
gradnal veil 

Of a sadness unconscious. 

The lady grew pale 

As silent her lord grew: and hoth, as 
they eyed 

Each the other askance, turned, and 
secretly sighed. 

Ah, wise friend, Mhat avails all ex- 
perience can give ? 

True, we know what life is— but, 
alas ! do we live ? 

The grammar of life we have gotten 
by heart. 

But life's self we have made a dead 
language, — an art, 

Not a voice. Could we speak it, but 
once, as 'twas spoken 

When the silence of passion the first 
time was broken ! 

Cuvier knew the world better than 
Adam, no doubt: 

But the last man, at best, was but 
learned about 

What the first, without learning, en- 
joyed. What art thou 

To the man of to-day, O Leviathan, 
now ? 

A science. What wert thou to him 
that from ocean 

First beheld thee appear ? A sur- 
prise, — an emotion ! 

When life leaps in the veins, when it 
beats in the heart, 

When it thrills as it fills every ani- 
mate part, 

Where lurks it ? how works it ? . . . 
we scarcely detect it. 

But life goes : the heart dies : haste, 
O leech, and dissect it ! 

This accursed resthetical, ethical age 

Hath so fingered life's hornbook, so 
blurred every page. 

That the old glad romance, the gay 
chivalrous story, 

With its fables of faery, its legends 
of glory, 

6 



Is turned to a tedious instruction, not 

new 
To the children that read it insipidly 

through. 
We know too much of Love ere we 

love. We can trace 
Nothing new, unexpected, or strange 

in his face 
When we see it at last. 'Tis the 

same little Cupid, 
With the same dimpled cheek, and 

the smile almost stupid. 
We have seen in our jjictures, and 

stuck on our shelves. 
And copied a hundred times over, 

ourselves. 
And wlierever we tiun, and what- 
ever we do. 
Still, that horrible sense of the d^a 

connu ! 

VI. 

Perchance 'twas the fault of the life 
that they led; 

Perchance 'twas the fault of the 
novels they read ; 

Perchance 'twas a fault in them- 
selves ; I am boimd not 

To say: this I know — that these two 
creatures found not 

In each other some sign they expectr- 
ed to find 

Of a something unnamed in the 
heart or the mind ; 

And, missing it, each felt a right to 
complain 

Of a sadness which each found no 
word to explain. 

Whatever it was, the world noticed 
not it 

In the light-hearted beauty, the light- 
hearted wit. 

StiU, • as once Avith the actors in 
Greece, 'tis the case. 

Each must speak to the crown with a 
mask on his face. 

Praise followed Matilda wherever 
she went. 

She was llattered. Can flattery pur- 
chase content ? 



LUCILE. 



Yes. While to its voice, for a mo- 
ment, she listened, 

The young cheek still bloomed, and 
the soft eyes still glistened; 

And her lord, when, like one of those 
light vivid things 

That glide down the gauzes of sum- 
mer with Avings 

Of rapturous radiance, unconscious 
she moved 

Through that buzz of inferior crea- 
tures, which proved 

Her beauty, their envy, one moment 
forgot 

'Mid the many charms there, the one 
charm that was not: 

And when o'er her beauty enrapt- 
ured he bowed, 

(As they turned to each other, each 
flushed from the crowd, ) 

And murmured those praises Avhich 
yet seemed more dear 

Than the praises of others had grown 
to her ear, 

She, too, ceased awhile her OAvn fate 
to regret : 

"Yes! . . ."he loves me," she sighed; 
" this is love, then,— and yet—!'' 
VII. 

Ah, that yet! fatal word! 'tis the 
moral of all 

Thought and felt, seen or done, in 
""this world since the Fall! 

It stands at the end of each sentence 
we learn ; 

It flits in the vista of all we discern ; 

It loads us, forever and ever, away 

To iind in to-morrow what flies with 
to-day. 

'Twas this same little fatal and mys- 
tical word [and lord 

That now, like a mirage, led my lady 

To the waters of Ems from the waters 
of Marah ; 

Drooping pilgrims in Fashion's 
blank, arid Sahara ! 
VIII. 

At the same time, pursued by a spell 
much the same. 

To these waters two other worn pil- 
grims there came: 



One a man, one a woman: just now, 

at tlie latter. 
As the Reader I mean by and by to 

look at her 
And judge for himself, I will not 

even glance. 



Of the self-crowned young kings of 

the Fashion in France 
Whose resplendent regalia so dazzled 

the sight, 
Whose horse was so perfect, whose 

boots were so bright, 
Who so hailed in the salon, so marked 

in the Bois, 
Who so welcomed by all, as Eugene 

de Luvois ? 
Of all the smooth-browed premature 

debauchees 
In that town of all towns, where De- 
bauchery sees 
On the forehead of youth her mark 

everywhere graven, — 
In Paris I mean, — where the streett 

are all paven 
By those two fiends whom Milton sav 

bridging the way 
From Hell to this planet,— who, 

haughty and gay, 
The free rebel of life, bound or led by 

no law% 
Walked that causeway as bold as 

Eugene de Luvois ? 
Yes ! he marched through the great 

masquerade, loud of tongue. 
Bold of brow : but the motley he 

masked in. it hung 
So loose, trailed so wide, and ap- 
peared to impede 
So strangely at times the vexed effort 

at speed. 
That a keen eye might guess it was 

made — not for him. 
But some brawler more stalwart of 

stature and limb. 
That it irked him, in truth, you at 

times could divine, 
For when low was the music, and 

spilt was the wine. 



LUCILE. 



^6 



He "would clutch at the garment, as 

though it oppressed 
And stifled some imijulse that choked 

in his hreast. 



What ! he. . . . the light sport of his 
frivolous ease ! 

Was he, too, a pi'ey to a mortal dis- 
ease ? 

My friend, hear a parahle : ponder 
it well : 

For a moral there is in the talc that 
I tell. 

One evening I sat in the Palais 
Royal, 

And there, while I laughed at Gras- 
sot and Arnal, 

My eye fell on the face of a man at 
my side ; 

Every time that he laugh"J I ob- 
served that he sighed, 

As though vexed to be pleased. I 
remarked that he sat 

111 at ease on his seat, and kept 
twirling his hat 

In his hand, with a look of imquiet 
abstraction. 

I inquired the cause of his dissatis- 
faction. 

"Sir," he said, "if what vexes me 
here you would know. 

Learn that, passing this way some 
few half-liours ago, 

I walked into the Fran<;ais, to look 
at Rachel. 

(Sir that woman in Phedre is a 
miracle ! )— Well, 

I asked for a box : they were oc- 
cupied all : 

For a seat in the balcony : all taken ! 
a stall : 

Taken too : the whole house was as 
full as could be, — 

Not a hole for a rat ! I had just time 
to see [friend 

The lady I love Ute-ii-tete with a 

In a box out of reach at the opposite 
end : 

Then the crowd pushed me out. 
What was left me to do ? 



I tried for the tragedy . . . que 

voulez-vous f 
Every place for the tragedy booked ! 

. . . m on ami, 
The farce was close by : ... at the 

farce hie void! 
The piece is a new one : and Gras- 

sot plays well : 
There is drollery, too, in that fellow 

Ravel : 
And Hyacinth's nose is superb ! . . . 

Yet I meant 
My evening elsewhere, and not thus, 

to have silent. 
Fate orders these things by her will, 

not by ours ! 
Sir, mankind is the sport of invisible 

i:)Owers,'' 

I once met the Due de Luvois for a 

moment ; 
And I marked, when his featru-es 1 

fixed in my comment. 
O'er those features the same vague 

disquietude stray 
I had seen on the face of my friend 

at the play ; 
And I thought that he too, very 

probably, spent 
His evenings not wholly as first he 

had meant. 

XI. 

O source of the holiest joys we in- 
herit, 
O Sorrow, thou solemn, invisible 

spirit ! 
Ill fares it v.ith man when, through 

life's desert sand, 
Grown impatient too soon for the 

long- promised land 
He turns from the worship of thee, 

as thou art. 
An expressless and imageless truth 

in the heart. 
And takes of the jewels of Egypt, 

the pelf 
And the gold of the godless, to make 

to himself 
A gaudy, idolatrous image of thee, 
And then bows to the sound of tho 

cymbal the knee. 



84 



LUCILE. 



The sorrows we make to ourselves 
are false gods : 

Like the prophets of Baal, our 
bosoms with rods 

We may smite, we maj' gash at our 
hearts till they bleed, 

But these idols are blind, deaf, and 
dumb to our need. 

The land is athirst, and cries out ! 
. . . 'tis in vain ; 

The great blessing of Heaven de- 
scends not in rain. 



It was night ; and the lamps were 
beginning to gleam 

Through the long linden-trees, fold- 
ed each in his dream, 

From that building which looks like 
a temple . . . and is 

The Temple of— Health ? jS'ay, but 
enter ! I wish 

That never the rosy-hued deity 
knew 

One votary out of that sallow- 
chesdied creAV 

Of Courlanders, Wallacs, Greeks, af- 
fable Kiissians, 

Explosive Parisians, potato-faced 
Prussians ; 

Jews — Hamburgh ers chiefly ; — pure 
patriots, — Suabians ; — 

" Cappadocians and Elamites, Cretes 
and Arabians, 

And the dwelleis in Pontus "... 
My rmise will not weary 

More lines with the list of them . . . 
ciirjrcvnicre 9 

What is it they murmur, and mutter, 
and hum ? 

Into what Pandemonium is Pente- 
cost come ? 

O, what is the name of the god at 
whose fane 

Every nation is mixed in so motley 
a train ? 

What weird Kabala lies on those 
tables outspread ? 

To what oracle turns with attention 
each head ? 



What holds these pale worshippers 

each so devout. 
And what are those hierophants 

busied about ? 



Here passes, repasses, and flits to 

and fro, 
And rolls without ceasing the great 

Yes and No : 
Roimd this altar alternate the ^^■eird 

Passions dance, 
And the God worshipped here is the 

old God of Chance. 
Through the wide-open doors of the 

distant saloon 
Flute, hautboy, and fiddle are 

squeaking in tune ; 
And an indistinct music forever is 

rolled, 
That mixes and chimes with the 

chink of the gold, 
From a vision, that flits in a lumin- 
ous haze. 
Of figures forever eluding the gaze ; 
It fleets tlu-ough the doorway, it 

gleams on the glass, 
xind the weird words pursue it — 

lloiKjc, Impair, et Fasse ! 
Like a sound borne in sleep through 

such dreams as encumber 
With haggard emotions the wild 

wicked slumber 
Of some witch when she seeks, 

through a night-mare, to grab 

at 
The hot hoof of the flend, on her 

way to the Sabbat. 

XIV. 

The Due de Luvois and Lord Alfred 
had met 

Some fcAV evenings ago (for the sea- 
son as yet 

Was but young) in this self-same 
Pavilion of Chance. 

The idler from England, the idler 
from France 

Shook hands, each, of course, with 
much cordial pleasure : 

An acquaintance at Ems is to most 
men a treasm'e, 



LUCILE. 



85 



And they both were too well-bred in 
aught to betray 

One discourteous remembrance of 
things i^assed away. 

'Twas a sight that was i)leasant, in- 
deed, to be seen, 

These friends exchange greetings ; — 
the men avIio had been 

Foes so nearly in days that were 
past. 

This, no doubt, 

Is why, on the night I am speaking 
about, 

My Lord Alfred sat down by him- 
self at roulette. 

Without one suspicion his bosom to 
fret, 

Although he had left, with his pleas- 
ant French friend, 

Matilda, half vexed, at the room's 
farthest end. 



Lord Alfi-ed his combat with For- 
tune began 

With a few modest thalers — away 
they all ran — 

The reserve followed fast in the rear. 
As his purse 

Grew lighter his spirits grew sensi- 
bly worse. 

One needs not a Bacon to find a 
cause for it : 

'Tis an old law in physics — Natura 
ahhorret 

Vacinun — and my lord, as he watch- 
ed his last crown 

Timible into the bank, turned away 
with a frown 

Which the brows of Napoleon him- 
self might have decked 

On that day of all days when an em- 
pire was wrecked 

On thy plain, Waterloo, and he wit- 
nessed the last 

Of his favorite Guard cut to pieces, 
aghast ! 

Just then Alfred felt, he could 
scarcely tell why. 

Within him the sudden strange 
sense that some eye 



Had long been intently regarding 
him there, — 

That some gaze was upon him too 
searching to bear. 

He rose and looked up. \Yas it fact ? 
Was it fable ? 

Was it dream? Was it waking? 
Across the green table. 

That face, ^^'ith its features so fa- 
tally known, — 

Those eyes, whose deep gaze an- 
swered strangely his own, — 

What was it ? Some ghost from its 
grave come again ? 

Some cheat of a feverish, fanciful 
brain ? 

Or was it herself — with those deep 
eyes of hers, 

And that face unforgotten ? — Lucile 
de Nevers ! 



Ah, well that pale woman a phan- 
tom might seem, 

Who appeared to herself but the 
dream of a dream ! 

'Neath those features so calm, that 
fair forehead so hushed, 

That pale cheek forever by passion 
unflushed, 

There yawned an insatiate void, and 
there heaved 

A tumult of restless regrets unre- 
lieved. 

The brief noon of beauty was pass- 
ing away. 

And the chill of the twilight fell, si- 
lent and gray. 

O'er that deep, self-perceived isola- 
tion of soul. 

And now, as all round her the dim 
evening stole. 

With its weird desolations, she in- 
wardly grieved 

For the want of that tender assur- 
ance received 

From the warmth of a whisper, the 
glance of an eye. 

Which should say, or should look, 
" Fear thou naught, — I am 
by!" 



86 



LUCILE. 



And thus, througli that lonely and 

self-fixed existence, 
Crept a vague sense of silence, and 

horror, and distance : 
A strange sort of faint-footed fear, 

— like a mouse 
That comes out, when 'tis dark, in 

some old ducal house 
Long deserted, where no one the 

creature can scare. 
And the forms on the arras are all 

that move there. 

In Rome, — in the Forum, — there 

opened one night 
A gulf. All tlie augurs turned iiale 

at the sight. 
In this omen the anger of Heaven 

they read. 
Men consulted the gods : then the 

oracle said : — [till at last 

" Ever open this gulf shnll endure, 
That which Rome hath most pre- 
cious within it be cast." 
The Romans tlirew in it their corn 

and their stuff, 
But the gulf yawned as wide. Rome 

seemed likely enough 
To he ruined ere this rent in her 

heart she could choke. 
Then Cm-tius, revering the oracle, 

spoke : [tion is come : 

" O Quirites ! to this Heaven's ques- 
What to Rome is most precious ? 

The manhood of Rome." 
He plimged, and the gulf closed. 

The tale is not new : 
But the moral applies many ways, 

and is true. 
How, for hearts rent in twain, shall 

the curse be destroyed ? 
'Tis a warm human life that must 

till up the void. 
Thorough many a heart runs the rent 

in the fable ; [able ? 

But who to discover a Curtius is 

XVII. 

Back she came from her long hiding- 
place, at the source 

Of the simrise ; where, fair in their 
fabulous course. 



Rmi the rivers of Eden : an exile 
again. 

To the cities of Europe,— the scenes, 
and the men. 

And the life, and the ways, she had 
left : still oppressed 

With the same hungry heart, and 
unpeaceable breast. 

The same, to the same things ! The 
Avorld, she had quitted 

With a sigh, with a sigh she re-en- 
tered. Soon ilitted 

Through the salons and clubs, to the 
great satisfaction [tion. 

Of Paris, the news of a novel attrac- 

The enchanting Lucile, the gay 
Countess, once more 

To her old friend, the World, had re- 
opened her loor ; 

The World came, and shook hands, 
and was pleased and amused 

With what the World then went away 
and abused. 

From the woman's fair fame it in 
naught could detract : 

'Twas the woman's free genius it 
vexed and attacked 

With a sneer at her freedom of ac- 
tion -and speech. 

But its light careless cavils, in truth, 
could not reach 

The lone heart they aimed at. Her 
tears fell beyond 

The world's limit, to feel that the 
world could respond 

To that heart's deepest, innermost 
yearning, in naught. 

'Tsvas no longer this,earth's idle in- 
mates she sought : 

The wit of the woman sufficed to 
engage 

In the woman's gay court the first 
men of the age. 

Some had genius ; and all, wealth 
of mind to confer 

On the world : but that wealth was 
not lavished for her. 

For the genius of man, though so 
human indeed, 

When called out to man's help by 
some great human need, 



The right to a man's chance ac- 
quaintance refuses 

To use what it hoards for mankind's 
nobler uses. 

Genius touches tlie world at but one 
point alone 

Of that spacious circumference, nev- 
er quite Ivnown 

To the world : all the infinite num- 
ber of lines 

That radiate thither a mere point 
combines, 

But one only, — some central affec- 
tion apart 

From the reach of the world, in 
which Genius is Heart, 

And love, life's fine centre, includes 
heart and mind. 

And therefore it was that Lucile 
sighed to find [her ken, 

Men of genius appear, one and all in 

When they stooped themselves to it, 
as mere clever men ; 

Artists, statesmen, and they in whose 
works are unfurled 

Worlds new-fashioned for man, as 
mere men of the world. 

And so, as alone now she stood, in 
the sight 

Of the sunset of youth, with her face 
from the light, 

And watched her own shadow grow 
long at her feet, 

As though stretched out, the shade 
of some other to meet. 

The woman felt homeless and child- 
less : in scorn 

She seemed mocked by the voices of 
children unborn ; 

And when from these sombre reflec- 
tions away 

She turned, with a sigh, to that gay 
world, more gay 

For her presence within it, she kneAV 
herself friendless ; 

That her path led from peace, and 
that path appeared endless ! 

That even her beauty had been but 
a snare. 

And her wit sharpened only the edge 
of despair. 



With a face all transfigured and 
flushed by surprise, 

Alfred turned to Lucile. With those 
deep searching eyes 

She looked into his own. Not a ! 
word that sh'e said, J 

Not a look, not a blush, one emotion 
betrayed. 

She seemed to smile through him, at 

something beyond : ; 

When she answered his questions, i 
she seemed to respond ! 

To some Aoice in herself. With no 
trouble descried, 

To each troubled inquiry she calmly , 
replied. j 

Not so he. At the sight of that face '. 
back again 

To his mind came the ghost of a 
long-stifled pain, 

A remembered resentment, half 
checked by a wild 

And relentful regret like a mother- 
less child 

Softly seeking admittance, with 
plaintive appeal, 

To the heart which resisted its en- 
trance. 

Lucile 

And himself thus, however, with 
freedom allowed 

To old friends, talking still side by 
side, left the crowd 

By the crowd unobserved. Not un- 
noticed, however. 

By the Duke and Matilda. Matilda 
had never 

Seen her husband's new friend. 

She had followed by chance. 

Or by instinct, the sudden, half- 
menacing glance 

Which the Duke, Mhen he witnessed 

their meeting, had turned ■ 

On Lucile and Lord Alfred ; and, 

scared, she discei'ued 
On his features the shade of a gloom 

so profound 
That she shuddered instinctively. 
Deaf to the sotmd 



t 



Of her voice, to some startled inquiry 

of liers 
He replied not, but murmured, " Lu- 

cile de Nevers 
Once again then ? so be it ! " In the 

mind of that man, 
At that moment, there shaped itself 

vaguely the plan 
Of a purpose malignant and dark, 

such alone 
(To his own secret heart but imper- 
fectly shown) 
As could spring from the cloudy, 

fierce chaos of thought 
By which all his nature to tumult 

was wrought. 

XIX. 

" So 1 " he thought, " they meet thus : 

and reweave the old charm ! 
And she hangs on his voice, and she 

leans on his arm, 
And she heeds me not, seeks me not, 

recks not of me ! 
O, what if I showed her that I, too, 

can be 
Loved by one — ^lier own rival — more 

fair and more young '? " 
The serpent rose in him : a serpent 

which, stung, 
Sought to sting. 

Each unconscious, indeed, of the 

eye 
Fixed upon them, Lucile and my 

lord sauntered by, 
In converse which seemed to be 

earnest. A smile 
Now and then seemed to show where 

their thoughts touched. Mean- 
while 
The muse of this story, convinced 

that they need her, 
To the Duke and Matilda returns, 

gentle Reader. 

XX. 

The Duke, with that sort of aggres- 
sive false praise 

Which is meant a resentful remon- 
strance to raise 

From a listener (as sometimes a 
judge, just before 



He pulls down the black cap, very 

gently goes o'er 
The case for the prisoner, and deals 

tenderly 
\Yith the man he is minded to hang 

by and by), 
Had referred to Lucilo, and then 

stopped to detect 
In the face of Matilda the growing 

effect 
Of the words he had dropped. 

Thei'e's no weapon that slays 
Its victim so surely (if well aimed) 

as praise. 
Thus, a i^ause on their converse had 

fallen: and now 
Each was silent, preoccupied, 

thoughtful. 

You know 
There are moments when silence, 

prolonged and unbroken, 
More expressive may be than all 

words ever spolvcn. 
It is when the heart has an instinct 

of what 
In the heart of another is passing. 

And that 
In the heart of JMatilda, what was it ? 

Whence came 
To her cheek on a sudden that trem- 
ulous flame ? 
What weighed down her head ? 

All your eye could discover 
Was the fact that Matilda was 

troubled. Moreover 
That trouble the Duke's presence 

seemed to renew. 
She, however, broke silence, the 

lirst of the two. 
The Duke was too prudent to shat- 
ter the spell 
Of a silence which suited his pur- 
pose so well. 
She was plucking the leaves from a 

pale blush rose blossom -' 

Which had fallen from the nosegay 

she held in her bosom. 
"This poor flower," she said, " seems 

it not out of place 
In this hot, lamplit air, with its 

fresh, fragile grace ?" 



LUCILE. 



89 



She bent her head low as she spoke. 
With a smile 

The Duke watched her caressing the 
leaves all the while. 

And continued on his side the si- 
lence. He knew 

This would force his companion 
their talk to renew 

At the point that he wished ; and 
Matilda divined 

The siuniticant pause with n^ew 
troulile i)f mind. 

She lifted one moment her head ; 
but her look 

Encountered the ardent regard of 
the Duke, 

And dropped back on her floweret 
abashed. Then, still seeking 

The assurance she fancied she 
showed him by speaking, 

She conceived herself safe in adopt- 
ing again 

The theme she should most have 
avoided just then. 

XXI. 

"Duke," she said, . . . and she felt, 

as she spoke, her cheek burned. 

"You know, then, this . . . lady?" 

" Too well ! " he returned. 

Matilda. 
True ; you drew Avith emotion her 
portrait just now. 

Luvois. 
With emotion ? 

Matilda. 
Yes, yes ! you described her, I know. 
As possessed of a charm all unri- 
valled. 

Luvois. 

Alas ! 
You mistook me completely ! You, 

madam, surpass 
This lady as moonlight does lamp- 
light ; as youth 
Surpasses its best imitations ; a^; 

truth 
The fairest of falsehoods surpasses ; 
as nature 



Surpasses art's masterpiece ; ay, as 
the creatui'e 

Fresh and pure in its native adorn- 
ment surpasses 

All the charms got by heart at the 
world's looking-glasses ! 

"Yet you said," — she continued 
with some trepidation, 

" That you quite comprehended "... 
a slight hesitation 

Shook the sentence, ..." a passion 
so strong as " 

Luvois. 

True, true ! 
But not in a man that had once 

looked at you. 
Nor can I conceive, or excuse, or . . . 
"Hush, hush!" 
She broke in, all more fair for one 

innocent blush. 
" Between man and woman these 

things differ so! 
It may be that the world pardons . . 

(how should I know ?) 
In you what it visits on us ; or 'tis 

true. 
It may be, that we women are better 

than you." 

Luvois. 

Who denies it ? Yet, madam, once 
more you mistake. 

The w^orld, in its judgment, some 
diiference may make 

'Twixt the man and the woman, so 
far as respects 

Its social enactments ; but not a? 
affects 

The one sentiment which, it were 
easy to prove, 

Is the sole law we look to the mo- 
ment we love. 

Matilda. 

That may be. Yet I think I should 

be less severe. 
Although so inexperienced in such 

things, I fear 



9° 



LUC J HE. 



I l\:ivo loarnod (hnt the hoait cannot 

always ropross 
Or aooouni for Iho lVolii\.!i-s which 

swav il. 

•* Yos ! yos ! 
That is too truo. indeed !■' ... the 

Dnko sighed. 

And again 
"'for one nionienl in siltMuvM'oniinucd 

Iho twain. 

\\n. 

A.t length the Ihike .slowly, as thongh 

he liad needed 
4.11 fhistin\e to repress his enu^^ions, 

priH-eeded ; 
' .\nd yet ! . . . what avails, then, to 

woman the gift 
Of a heanty like yonrs, if it eannot 

nplifi 
Her lieart from tlie reach of one 

donbt. one despair. 
One pang of wronged love, to which 

women less fair 
Aro exposed, when they love '} " 

^Yith a ipiick change of tone. 
As thongh by ivsentnient imiH>lled. 

he went on : — 
■'The name that yon bear, it iswhis- 

])ered. you took 
From love, not convention. Well, 

lady. . . . that look 
So o>ccited. so keen, on the face yon 

nuist know 
Throughout all its expivssions. — that 

rapuuvns glow — 
Those eKHpient features — signiticant 

eyes — 
Which that pale wonian sees, yet be- 
trays t»o surprise." 
lie pointed his hand as he spoke to 

the door, 
I'ixing with it l.ncile and Lord Al- 

frcil,) . . . "• l>efore, 
1 lave you ever oneo seen what just 

now yon may view 
In that face so fan\iliar ? . . . no, 

lady, 'tis new. 
Young, lovely, and loving, no doubt, 

as you aiv. 
Are YOU loved ?"' . . 



will. 

lie looked at her — paused — felt if 

thus far 
The ground held yet. The ardor with 

which he had spoken. 
This close, rapid iiucsiion. thus sud- 
denly broken. 
Inspired in ^latilda a vaune sense of 

fear. 
As though S(>me iuilctinite danger 

were near. 
With composure, however, at once 

she replied : — 
" 'Tis three years since the day when 

1 lirst was a bride. 
And my husband 1 never had cause 

to suspect; 
Nor ever have stooped, sir, such cause 

to detect. [see — 

Yet if in his looks or his acts I should 
See, or fancy — some ii\oment's ob- I 

livion of mo, 
1 trust that 1 too should forget it, — 

for you ! 

Must have seen that n»y heart is my i 

husband's." \ 

The hue \ 

On ht>r check, with the otYor; where- I 

with to the l>uke 
She had nltorod this vague and lialf- 

frighteued rebuke. 
Was white as the rose in licr hand. 

The last wonl 
Seemed to die on her Up. and could 

scarcely be hoanl. 
Theiv was silence again. 

A groat stop had boon made 
l>y the Ihike in the wonls lie that 

evening had said. 
There, half drowned by the music, 

Matilda, that night. 
Had listened, — long listened, — no 

doubt, in despite 
Of herself, to a voii>e she should 

never have hoanl. 
And her heart by that voice had 

been tumbled and stirred. 
And so, having sulYered in silence his 

eye 
To fathom her own, he resumed, with 

a sigh : 



LUCILE. 



91 



XXIV. 

"Will you suffer irie, lady, your 
tliou'^hts to invade 

By disclosiniij iriy own ? The posi- 
tion," lie said, 

"Jn wliicJj wo so strangely seem 
placed may excuse 

'J'lie frankness and force of the words 
whicli 1 use. 

You say that your heart is your hus- 
band's. You say 

That you love him. You think so, 
of course, lady . . . nay, 

Such a love, I admit, were a merit, 
no doubt. 

Ihit, trust me, no true love there can 
be without 

lis dread penalty — jealousy, 

'' Well, do not start ! 

Until now, — either thanks to a singu- 
lar art 

Of supreme self-control, you have 
held them all down 

(Jnrevealed in your heart, — or you 
never liuve known 

Even one of those fierce irresistible 
pangs 

Which deep passion engenders ; that 
anguish wJiich hangs 

On tlie heart like a nightmare, by 
jealousy bred. 

iJut if, lady, the love you describe, in 
the bed [posed 

Of a blissful seciuity thus hath re- 

(Jndisturbe<I with mild eyelids on 
happiness closed, 

Were it not to expose to a peril un- 
just. 

And most cruel, that hapi)y rej)Ose 
you so trust 

To meet, to receive, and, indeed, it 
inay be, [to see 

For how long I know not, continue 

A woman whose place rivals yours in 
the li-'e 

And the heart which not only your 
title of wife, 

But also (forgive me !) your beauty 
alone. 

Should have ma<h; wholly yours? — 
You, who gave all your own I 



Reflect !— 'tis the peace of existence 
you stake 

On the tiini of a die. And for whose 
— for his sake ? 

While yon witness this woman, the 
false point of view 

from which she must now be re- 
garded by you 

Will exaggerate to you, whatever 
they be, 

The charms 1 admit she i^ossesses. 
T<j me 

They are trivial indeed ; yet to your 
eyes, I, fear 

And foresee, they will true and in- 
trinsic appear. 

Self-un<X)iiscious, and sweetly iinable 
to guess 

How more lovely by far is tlie grace 
you possess, 

You will wrong your own beauty. 
The graf:es of art. 

You will take for the natural charm 
of the heart ; 

Studied manners, the biilliant and 
bold repartee. 

Will too soon in that fatal compari- 
son be 

To your fancy more fair than the 
sweet timid sense 

AVhich, in ^lirinking, betrays its own 
best eloquence. 

O then, lady, then, you will feel in 
your heart 

The poisonous pain of a fierce jeal- 
ous dart ! 

While you see her, yourself you no 
longer will see, — 

You will hear her, and hear not your- 
self, — you will be 

Unhapi»y ; unhappy, because you 
will deem 

Your own iKjwer less great than her 
power will seem. 

And I shall not be by your side, day 
by day [to say 

In despite of your noble displeasure, 

' You are fairer than she, as the star 
is more fair 

Than the diamond, the brightest 
that beauty can wear 1 ' " 



92 



LUCILE. 



This appeal, both by looks and by 

language, increased 
The trouble M-atilda felt grown in 

her breast. 
Still she spoke with what calmness 

she could : — 

'' Sir, the while 
I thank you,'' she said, with a faint 

scornful smile, 
"For your fervor in painting my 

fancied distress : 
Allow me the right some suiprise to 

cxi^ress 
At the zeal you betray in disclosing 

to nie 
The possible depth of my own 

misery." 
"That zeal would not startle you, 

madam," he said, 
" Could you read in my heart, as 

myself I have read. 
The peculiar interest which causes 

that zeal — " 

Matilda her terror no more could 
conceal. 

"Duke," she answered in accents 
sliort, cold, and severe. 

As she rose from her seat, ' ' I con- 
tinue to hear ; 

But permit me to say, I no more 
understand." 

"Forgive !" with a nervous appeal 

of the hand, 
And a well-feigned confusion of 

voice and of look, 
"Forgive, O, forgive me !" at once 

cried the I)uke, 
" I forgot that you know me so 

slightly. Your leave 
I entreat (from your auger those 

words to retrieve) 
For one moment to speak of myself, 

— for I think 
That you wrong me — " 
His voice as in i^ain seemed to 

sink ; 
And tears in his eyes, as ho lifted 

llieni, glistened. 



Matilda, despite of herself, sat and 
listened. 

XXVII. 

" Beneath an exterior which seems, 

and may be, 
Worldly, frivolous, careless, my 

heart hides in me," 
He continued, "a sorrow which 

draws nie to side 
With all things that suffer. Nay, 

laugh not," he cried, 
"At so strange an avowal. 

"I seek at a ball, 
For instance, — the beauty admired 

by all ? 
No ! some jdain, insignificant creat- 

in-e, who sits 
Scorned of course by the beauties, 

and shunned by the wits. 
All the world is accustomed to 

wound, or neglect, 
Or oppress, claims my heart and 

commands my x'espect. 
No Quixote, I do not affect to be- 
long, 
I admit, to those chartered redres- 

sers of wrong ; 
But I seek to console, where I can. 

'Tis a part 
Not brilliant, 1 own, yet its joys 

bring no smart." 
These trite words, from the tone 

which he gave them, received 
An appearance of truth, which 

might well be believed 
By a lieait shrewder yet than Ma- 
tilda's. 

And so 
He continued . . . " O lady ! alas, 

could you know 
What injustice and wrong in this 

Avorld I have seen ! 
How many a woman, believed to 

have been [aside 

Without a regret, I have known turn 
To burst into heart-broken tears un- 

descried ! 
On how many a lip have I witnessed 

the smile 



LUCILE. 



93 



Whicli but liid "what was breaking 

llie poor heart the while !" 
Said Matilda. "Your life, it would 

seem, then, must be 
One long act of devotion." 

" Perhaps so," said he ; 
''But at least that devotion small 

merit can boast, 
For one day may yet come, — if one 

day at the most, — 
When, perceiving at last all the dif- 
ference — how great ! — 
'Twixt the heart that neglects and 

the heart that can wait. 
'Twixt the natures that pity, the 

natures that pain. 
Some woman, that else might have 

passed in disdain 
Or indifference by me, — in passing 

that day 
Might pause with a word or a smile 

to repay 
This devotion, — and then "... 



To Matilda's relief 

At that nioiueut her husband ap- 
prc'uhed. 

"With some grief 

I must own that her welcome, per- 
chance, was expressed 

The more eagerly just for one twinge 
in her breast 

Of a conscience disturbed, and her 
smile not less wai-ni. 

Though she saw the Comtesse de 
Nevers on liis arm. 

Tlie Duke turned and adjusted his 
collar. 

Thought he, 

" Good ! the gods fight my battle to- 
night. I foresee 

That the family doctor's the part I 
must play. 

Very well ! but the patients my 
visits shall pay." 

Lord Alfred presented Lucile to his 
wife ; 

And Matilda, repressing with effort 
the strife 



Of emotions which made her voice 
shake, mui-mured low 

Some faint, troubled greeting. The 
Duke, with a bow 

Which betokened a distant defiance, 
i-eplied 

To Lucile' s startled cry, as surprised 
she descried 

Her former gay wooer. Anon, with 
the grace 

Of that kindness which seeks to win 
kindness, her place 

She assumed by Matilda, uncon- 
scious, perchance, 

Or resolved not to notice, the half- 
frightened glance 

That followed that movement. 

The Duke to his feet 

Arose ; and, in silence, relinquished 
his seat. 

One must own that the moment was 
awkward for all ; 

But nevertheless, before long, the 
strange thrall 

Of Lucile's gracious tact was by 
every one felt, 

And from each the reserve seemed, 
reluctant, to melt ; 

Thus, conversing together, the whole 
of the four 

Tludugh the crowd sauntered, smil- 
ing. 



Approaching tlie door, 
Eugene de Luvois, Avho had fallen 

behind. 
By Lucile, after some hesitation, 

was joined 
With a gpstiire of gentle and kuidly 

appeal 
Which appeared to imply, without 

words, '■ Let us feel 
That the friendship between us in 

years that are fled, 
Has survived one mad moment for- 
gotten," she said, 
" You remain, Duke, at Ems ? " 

He tin-ned on her a look 
Of frigid, resentful, and sullen re- j 

buice : 



'— 



94 



LUCILE. 



And then, with a more than signif- 
icant glance 

At Matilda, maliciously answered, 
'■ Perchance 

I have here an attraction. And 
you ?" he returned. 

Lucile's eyesliad followed his owi>, 
and discerned ^ 

The boast they implied. 

He repeated, " And you ? " 

And, still watching Matilda, she an- 
swered, " I too." 

And he thought, as wilh that word 
she left him, she sighed. 

The next moment her place she re- 
sumed by the side 

Of Matilda ; and soon they shook 
hands at the gate 

Of the self-same hotel. 



One depressed, one elate. 

The Duke and Lord Alfred again, 
through the glooms 

Of the thick linden alley, retm-ned 
to the Kooms. 

His cigar cacli had lighted, a moment 
before. 

At the inn, as they turned, arm-in- 
arm, from the door. 

Ems cigars do not cheer a man's 
spirits, experto 

{Ma miserum quoties !) crede Bo- 
berto. 

In silence, awhile, they walked on- 
ward. 

At last 

The Duke's thoughts to language 
half consciously passed. 

Luvois. 
Once more. ! yet once more I 

Alfked. 

Wliat ? 
Lirvois. 
We meet her, once more, 
The woman for whom we two mad 

men of yore 
(Laugh, mon cher Alfred, laugh ! ) 

were about to destroy 
Each the other I 



Alfred. 
It is not witli laughter that I 
Eaise the ghost of that once troubled 

time. Say ! can you 
Eecall it with coolness and quietude 
now ? 

Luvois. 

Now ? yes ! I, mon cher, am a true 

Parisien : 
Now, the red revolution, the tocsin, 

and then 
The dance and the play. ■ I am now 

at the play. 

Alfred. 
At the play, are you now ? Then 

perchance I now may 
Presume, Duke, to ask you what, 

ever until 
Such a moment, I waited . . . 

Luvois. 
Oh ! ask what you will. 
Franc jeu ! on the table my cards I 

spread out. 
Ask ! 

Alfred. 
Duke, you Avere called to a meeting 
(no doubt 
You remember it yet) with Lucile. 

It was night 
When you went ; and before you re- 
turned it was light. 
We met : you accosted me then with 

a brow 
Bright with triumph : your words 

(you remember them now ?) 
Were "Let us be friends ! " 

Luvois. 

Well ? 
Alfred. 
How then, after that, 
Can you ai^d she meet as acquaint- 
ances ? 

Luvois. 

What I 
Did she not then, herself, theCom- 

tesse de Nevers, 
Solve yom- riddle to-night with thoso 
soft lips of hers ? 



LUCILE. 



95 



Alfred. 

In our converse to-night we avoided 
the past. 

But the question I ask should be an- 
swered at last : 

By you, if you will ; if you will not, 
by her. 

Luvois. 

Indeed ? but that question, milord, 
can it stir 

Such an interest in you, if your pas- 
sion be o'er ? 

Alfred. 
Yes. Esteem may remain, although 

love be no more. 
Lucile asked me, this night, to my 

wife (understand 
To my wife!) to present her. I did 

so. Her hand 
Has clasped that of Matilda. We 

gentlemen owe 
Respect to the name that is ours : 

and, if so, [respect. 

To the woman that bears it a twofold 
Answer, Due de Ll^voi3 ! Did Lucile 

then reject 
The proffer you made of your hand 

and your name ? 
Or did you on her love then relin- 
quish a claim 
Urged before ? I ask bluntly this 

question, because 
My title to do so is clear by the laws 
That all gentlemen honor. Make 

only one sign 
That you know of Lucile de Nevers 

aught, in fine. 
For which, if yom* own virgin sister 

were by, 
From Lucile you would shield her 

acquaintance, and I 
And Matilda leave Ems on the mor- 
row. 

XXXI. 

The Duke 
Hesitated and paused. He could 

tell, by the look 
Of the man at his side, tliat he 

meant what he said, 



And there flashed in a moment these 
thoughts through liis head : 

" Leave Ems ! would that suit me ? 
no ! tliat were ag.ain 

To mar all. And besides, if I do not 
explain, 

She herself will . . . et puis, il a 
raison ; on est 

Gentilhomme avant tout!" He re- 
plied therefore, 

"Nay ! 

Madame de Nevers had rejected me. 

In those days, I was mad ; and in 
some mad reply 

I threatened the life of the rival to 
whom 

That rejection was due, I was led to 
presume. 

She feared for his life ; and the letter 
which then 

She wrote me, I showed you ; we 
met : and again 

My hand was refused, and my love 
was denied, 

And the glance you mistook was the 
vizard which Pride 

Lends to Humiliation. 

" And so," lialf in jest, 

He went on, " in this best world, 'tis 
all for the best ; 

You are wedded, (blessed English- 
man ! ) wedded to one 

Whose past can be called into ques- 
tion by none : 

And I (fickle Frenchman ! ) can still 
laugh to feel 

I am lord of myself, and the Mode : 
and Lucile 

Still shines from her pedestal, frigid 
and fair 

As yon German moon o'er the linden- 
tops there ! [troth 

A Dian in marble that scorns any 

With the little love-gods, whom I 
thank for us both. 

While she smiles from her lonely 
Olympus apart, 

That her arrows are marble as well 
as her heart. 

Stay at Ems, Alfred Vargrave ! " 



96 



LUCILE. 



The Duke, with a smile, 
Turned and entered Ihe Hoonis 

which, thus talking, mean- 

M'hile, 
They had reached. 

XXXIII. 

Alfred Vargrave strode on (over- 
thrown 
Heart and mind !) in the darkness 

bewildered, alone : 
" And so," to himself did he mutter, 

" and so 
'Twas to rescue my life, gentle 

spirit ! and, oh, 
For this did I doubt her ? . . . a light 

word — a look — 
The mistake of a moment ! . . . for 

this I forsook — 
For this ? Pardon, pardon, Lucilc ! 

OLucile !" 
Thought and memory rang, like a 

funeral pea]. 
Weary changes on one dirge-like note 

through his brain, 
As he strayed dovvu the darkness. 



Ee-entering again 
The Casino, the Duke smiled. He 

turned to roulette. 
And sat down, and played fast, and 

lost largely, and yet 
He still smiled : night deepened : he 

played his last number : 
Went home : and soon slept : and 

still smiled in his shunber. 



In his desolate Maxims, La Roche- 
foucauld wrote, 

"In the grief or mischance of a 
friend you may note. 

There is something whicli always 
gives pleasure." 

Alas ! 

That reflection fell short of the truth 
as it was. 



La- Eochefoucauld might have as 

truly set down, — 
" No misfortune, but what some one 

turns to his own 
Advantage its mischief : no sorroAv, 

but of it [profit : 

There ever is somebody ready to 
No affliction without its stock-job- 
bers, Avho all 
Gamble, speculate, play on the rise 

and the fall 
()f ariother man's heart, and make 

traffic in it." 
Burn thy book, O La Rochefoucauhl ! 
Fool ! one man's wit 
All men's selfishness how should it 

fathom ? 

O sage. 
Dost thou satirize Natui'e ? 

She laughs at thy page. 



CANTO 11. 



Cousin John to Cousin Alfked. 

"LoNrON, 18—. 
'• My DKAii Alfked : 

Your last letters put me in paiu. 
This contempt of existence, this list- 
less disdain 
Of your own life, — its joys and its 

• duties, — the deuce 
Take my wits if they find for it h«!f 

an excuse ! 
I wish that some Frenchman Avoidd 

shoot off your leg. 
And compel you to stump through 

the world on a peg! 
I wish that you had, like myself, 

(niore's the pity !) 
To sit seven hours on this cursed 

committee. 
I wish that you Iniew, sir, how salt 

is the bread 
Of another — (what is it that Dante 

lias said ?) 
And the trouble of other men's stairs. 

In a word, 
I wish fate had some real aflaictiou 

conferred 



On your whimsical self, that, at 

least, you had cause 
For neglecting life's duties, and 

damning its laws ! 
This pressure against all the pur- 
pose of life, 
This self-ebullition, and ferment, and 

strife. 
Betokened, I grant that it may be in 

truth, 
The richness and strength of the 

new wine of youth. 
But if, when the wine should have 

mellowed with time, 
Being bottled and binned, to a flavor 

sublime 
It retains the same acrid, incongru- 
ous taste. 
Why, the sooner to throw it away 

that Ave haste 
The better, I take it. And this vice 

of snarling, 
Self-love's little lapdog, the overfed 

darling 
Of a hypochondriacal fancy apjiears. 
To my thinking, at least, in a man 

of your years, 
At the midnoon of mafihood with 

plenty to do, 
And every incentive for doing it 

too, — 
With the duties of life just suffi- 
ciently pressing 
For praj'er, and of joys more than 

most men for blessing ; 
With a pretty young wife, and a 

pretty full purse, — 
Like poltroonery, puerile truly, or 

worse ! 
I wish I could get you at least to 

agree 
To take life as it is, and consider 

with me, 
If it be not all smiles, that it is not 

all sneers ; 
It admits honest laughter, and needs 

honest tears. 
Do you think none have known but 

yourself all the pain 
Of hopes that retreat, and regrets 

that remain ? 



And all the wide distance fate fixes, 

no doubt, 
'Twixt the life that's within, and the 

life that's without ? 
What one of us finds the world just 

as he likes ? 
Or gets what he wants when he 

wants it ? Or strikes 
Without missing the thing that he 

strikes at the first ? 
Or walks without stumbling ? Or 

quenches his thirst 
At one draught ? Bah ! I tell you 1 

I, bachelor John, 
Have had griefs of my own. But 

what then ? I push on 
All the faster perchance that I yet 

feel the pain 
Of my last fall, albeit I may stumble 

again. 
God means every man to be happy, 

be sure. 
He sends us no sorrows that have 

not some cure. 
Our duty down here is to do, not to 

know. 
Live as though life were earnest, and 

life will be so. 
Let each moment, like Time's last 

ambassador, come : 
It will wait to deliver its message ; 

and some 
Sort of answer it merits. It is not 

the deed 
A man does, but the way that he 

does it, should plead 
For the man's compensation in do- 
ing it. 

"Here, 
My next neighbor's a man with 

twelve thousand a year, 
Who deems that life has not a pas- 
time more pleasant 
Than to follow a fox or to slaughter 

a pheasant. 
Yet this fellow goes through a con- 
tested election. 
Lives in London, and sits, like tho 

soul of dejection, 
All the day through upon a commit- 
tee, and late 



To the last, every night, tlirougli the 
dreary debate, 

As tliough he were getting each 
speaker by lieart. 

Though amongst them he never pre- 
sumes to take part. 

One asks liiniself why, without mur- 
mur or question, 

He foregoes all his tastes, and de- 
stroys liis digestion, 

For a labor of which the result seems 
so small. 

' The man is ambitious,' you say. 
Not at all. 

He has just sense enough to be fully 
aware 

That he never can liope to be Pre- 
mier, or share 

The renown of a TuUy ; — or even to 
hold 

A subordinate office. He is not so 
bold 

As to fancy the House for ten min- 
utes would bear 

With patience his modest opinions 
to hear. 

' But he wants something ! ' 
"What ! with twelve thousand a 
year ? 

What could Government give him 
would be half so dear 

To his heart as a walk with a dog 
and a gun 

Through his own pheasant woods, 
or a capital run ? 

' No ; but vanity fills out the emptiest 
brain ; 

The man would be more than his 
neighbors, 'tis plain ; 

And the drudgery drearily gone 
through in town 

Is more than repaid by provincial 
renown. 

Enough if some Marchioness, lively 
and loose. 

Shall have eyed him with passing 
complaisance ; the goose. 

If the Fashion to him open one of 
its doors. 

As proud as a sultan, returns to his 
boors.' 



Wrong again ! if you think so. 

'' For, j^rimo ; my friend 

Is the head of a family known from 
one end 

Of his shire to the other, as the old- 
est ; and therefore 

He despises tine lords and fine ladies. 
He care for 

A peerage ? no, truly ! Secondo ; he 
rarely 

Or never goes out : dines at Bella- 
my's sparely, 

And abhors w^hat you call the gay 
world. 

" Then, I ask. 

What inspires, and consoles, such a 
self-imposed task 

As the life of this man, — but the 
sense of its duty ? 

And I swear tliat the eyes of the 
haughtiest beauty 

Have never inspired in my soul that 
intense. 

Reverential, and loving, and absolute 
sense [man. 

Of heartfelt admiration I feel for this 

As I see him beside me ; — there, 
wearing the wan 

London daylight away, on his hum- 
drum committee ; 

So unconscious of all that awakens 
my pity, 

And wonder — and worship, I might 
say. 

" To me 

There seems something nobler than 
genius to be 

In that dull patient labor no genius 
relieves. 

That absence of all joy which yet 
never grieves ; 

The humility of it ! the grandeur 
withal ! 

The sublimity of it ! And yet, 
should you call 

The man's oavu very slow apprehen- 
sion to this. 

He would ask, with a stare, what 
sublimity is ! 

His work is the duty to which he 
was born ; 



LUCILE. 



99 



He accepts it, without ostentation or 

scorn : 
And this man is no uncommon type 

(I tliank Heaven ! ) 
Of this land's common men. In all 

other lands, even 
The tj'pe's self is wanting. Per- 
chance, 'tis the reason 
That Government oscillates ever 

'twixt treason 
And tyranny elsewhere. 

" I wander away 
Too far, though, from what I was 

wishing to say. 
You, for instance, read Plato. You 

know that the soul 
Is immortal ; and put this in rhyme, 

on the whole. 
Very well, with suhlime illustration. 

Man's heart 
Is a mystery, doubtless. You trace 

it in art : — 
The Greek Psyche, — that's beauty, — 

. the perfect ideal. 
But then comes the imperfect, pei'- 

fectible real, 
With its pained aspiration and strife. 

In those pale 
Ill-drawn virgins of Giotto you see 

it prevail. 
You have studied all this. Then, 

the universe, too. 
Is not a mere house to be lived in, 

for you. [know 

Geology opens the mind. So you 
Something also of strata and fos- 
sils ; these show 
The bases of cosmical structure : 

some mention 
Of the nebuloits theory demands 

your attention ; 
And so on. 

" In short, it is clear the interior 
Of your brain, my dear Alfred, is 

vastly superior 
In fibre, and fulness, and function, 

and fire, 
To that of my poor parliamentary 

squire ; 
But your life leaves upon me (for- 
give me this heat 



Due to friendship) the sense of a 

thing incomplete. 
You fly high. But what is it, in 

truth, you fly at ? 
My mind is not satisfied quite as to 

that. 
An old illustration 's as good as a 

new, 
Provided the old illustration be 

true. 
We are children. Mere kites are the 

fancies we fly. 
Though we marvel to see them as- 
cending so high ; 
Things slight in themselves, — long- 
tailed toys, and no more. 
What is it that makes the kite 

steadily soar 
Through the realms where the cloud 

and the whirlwind have birth 
But the tie that attaches the kite to 

the earth ? 
I remember the lessons of childhood, 

j'ou see, 
And the hornbook 1 learned on my 

poor mother's knee. 
In truth, I suspect little else do we 

learn 
From this great book of life, which 

so shrewdly we tm-n. 
Saving how to apply, with a good or 

bad grace. 
What we learned in the hornbook 

of childhood. 

" Your case 
Is exactly in point. 

" Fly your kite, if you please. 
Out of sight : let it go where it will, 

on the breeze ; 
But cut not the one thread by which 

it is bound. 
Be it never so high, to this poor 

human ground. 
No man is the absolute lord of his 

life. 
You, my friend, have a home, and a 

sweet and dear wife. 
If I often have sighed by my own 

silent fire, 
With a sense of a sometimes recur- 
ring desire 



For a voice sweet and low, or a face 
fond and fair, 

Some dull winter evening to solace 
and share 

With the love which the world its 
good children allows 

To. shake hands with, — in short, a 
legitimate spouse, 

This thousht has consoled me : "A.t 
least I have given 

For my own good behavior no host- 
age to heaven." 

You have, though. Forget it not ! 
faith, if you do, 

I would rather break stones on a 
road than be you. 

If any man wilfully injured, or led 

That little girl wrong, I woidd sit on 
his head, 

Even though you yourself were the 
sinner ! 

"And this 

Leads me back (do not take it, dear 
cousin, amiss ! ) 

To the matter I meant to have men- 
tioned at once, 

But these thoughts put it out of my 
head for the nonce. 

Of all the preposterous humbugs and 
shams, [lambs, 

Of all the old wolves ever taken for 

The wolf best received by the flock 
he devours 

Is that imcle-in-law, my dear Alfred, 
of yovu-s. 

At least, this has long been my set- 
tled conviction. 

And I almost would venture at once 
the prediction 

That before very long — but no mat- 
ter ! I trust 

For his sake and our own, that I 
may be unjust. 

But Heaven forgive me, if cautious 
I am on 

The score of such men as, with both 
God and Mammon, 

Seem so shrewdly familiar. 

" Neglect not this warning. 

There were rumors afloat in the City 
this morning 



Which I scarce like the sound of. 

Who knows ? would he fleece 
At a pinch, the old hypocrite, even 

his own niece '? 
For the sake of Matilda I cannot im- 
portune 
Your attention too early. If all your 

wife's fortune 
Is yet in the hands of that specious 

old sinner. 
Who would dice with the devil, and 

yet rise up winner, 
I say, lose no time ! get it out of the 

gi-ab 
Of her trustee and micle, Sir Kidley 

McNab. 
I trust those deposits, at least, are 

drawn out, 
And safe at this moment from 

danger or doubt. 
A wink is as good as a nod to the 

wise. [justifies 

Verbum sap. I admit nothing yet 
My mistrust ; but I have in my own 

mind a notion 
That old Ridley's white waistcoat, 

and airs of devotion. 
Have long been the only ostensible 

capital 
On which he does basiness. If so, 

time must sap it all. 
Sooner or later. Look sharp. Do 

not wait. 
Draw" at once. In a fortnight it may 

be too late. 
I admit I know nothing. I can but 

suspect ; 
I give you my notions. Form yours 

and reflect. 
My love to Matilda. Her mother 

looks well. 
I saw her last w^eek. I have noth- 
ing to tell 
Worth your hearing. We think that 

the Government here 
Will not last our next session. Fitz 

Funk is a peer. 
You will see by the Times. There 

are symptoms which show 
That the ministers now are prepar- 
ing to go, 



LUCILE. 



loi 



And finish their feast of the loaves 

and the fishes. 
It is evident tliat they are clearing 

the dislies, 
And cramming tlieir pockets with 

bon-bons. Your news 
Will be always acceptable. Vere, of 

the BlueSj 
Has bolted with Lady Selina. And 

so, 
You have met with that hot-headed 

Frenchman? I know 
That the man is a sad mavcvais sujet. 

Take care 
Of Matilda. I wish I could join you 

both there ; 
But, before I am fcee, you are sure 

to be gone. 
Good-by, my dear fellow. Yours, 

anxiously, 

" John." 



This is just the advice I myself would 

have given 
To Lord Alfred, had I been his 

cousin, which, Heaven 
Be praised, I am not. But it reached 

him indeed 
In an imlucky hour, and received lit- 
tle heed. 
A half-languid glance was the most 

that he lent at 
That time to these homilies. Pri- 

mum dementat 
Qiiem Deus tult 2)erdere. Alfred in 

fact 
Was behaving just then in a way to 

distract 
Job's self had Job known him. The 

more you'd have thought 
The Duke's court to Matilda his eye 

Avould have caught, 
The more did his aspect grow listless 

to hers. 
And the more did it beam to Lucile 

de Nevers. 
And Matilda, tlie less she found love 

in the look 



Of her husband, the less did she 

shrink from the Duke. 
With each day that passed o'er them, 

the}'' each, heart from heart, 
Woke to feel themselves further and 

further apart. 
More and more of his time Alfred 

passed at the table ; 
Played high ; and lost more than to 

lose he was able. 
He grew feverish, querulous, absent, 

perverse, — 
And here I must mention, what 

made matters worse. 
That Lucile and the Duke at the self- 
same hotel 
With the Vargraves resided. It 

needs not to tell 
That they all saw too much of each 

other. The weather 
Was so line that it brought them 

each day all together 
In the garden, to listen, of course, to 

the baud. 
The house was a sort of phalanstery; 

and 
Lucile and Matilda were pleased to 

discover 
A mutual passion for music. More- 
over, 
The Duke was an excellent tenor : 

coidd sing 
" Anrje si pure'^ in a way to bring 

down on the wing 
All the angels St. Cicely played to. 

My lord 
Would also at times, when he was 

not too bored. 
Play Beethoven, and Wagner's new 

music, not ill ; 
With some little things of his own, 

showing skill. 
For which reason, as well as for some 

others too, 
Their rooms were a pleasant enough 

rendezvous. 
Did Lucile, then, encourage (the 

heartless coquette !) 
All the mischief she could not but 

mark ? 

Patience yet I 



102 



LUCILE. 



m. 

In that garden, an arbor, withdrawn 

from the sun, 
By laburnum and lilac with blooms 

overrun. 
Formed a vault of cool verdure, 

which made, when the heat 
Of the noontide hung heavy, a gra- 
cious retreat. 
And hei-e, with some friends of their 

own little world, 
In the warm afternoons, till the 

shadows uncurled 
From the feet of the lindens, and 

crept through the grass. 
Their blue hours would this gay little 

colony pass. 
The men loved to smoke, and the 

women to bring, 
Undeteried by tobacco, their work 

there, and sing 
Or converse, till the dew fell, and 

homeward the bee 
Floated, heavy with honey. Towards 

eve there was tea 
(A luxury due to Matilda), and ice, 
Fruit, and coffee. '^ '"Eainpe, nivra 

<t>dpei.<; : 

Such an evening it was, while Ma- 
tilda presided 

O'er the rustic arrangements thus 
daily provided, 

"With the Duke, and a small German 
Prince with a thick head, 

And an old Russian Countess both 
witty and wicked, 

And two Austrian Colonels, — that 
Alfred, who yet 

Was lounging alone with his last 
cigarette, 

Saw Lucile de Nevers by herself 
pacing slow 

'Neath the shade of the cool linden- 
trees to and fro. 

And joining her, cried, " Thank the 
good stars, we meet ! 

I have so much to say to you ! " 

" Yes ? . . . " with her sweet 

Serene voice, she replied to him . . . 
" Yes ? and I too 



Lucile ! 



Was wishing, indeed, to say some- 
what to you." 

She was paler just then than her 
wont was. The sound 

Of her voice had within it a sadness 
profound. 

" You are ill ? " he exclaimed, 

" No ! " she hurriedly said, 

" No, no ! " I 

" You alarm me I " ; 

She drooped down her bead. 

"If your thoughts have (if late 
sought, or cared, to divine 

The purpose of what has been pass- 
ing in mine. 

My farewell can scarcely ala,rm you." 



Alfred. 
Your farewell ! you go ! 

Lucile. 

Yes, Lord Alfred. 

Alfeed. 

Reveal 
The cause of this sudden unkind- 

ness. 

Lucile. 

Unkind ? 
Alfked. 
Yes ! what else is this parting ? 
Lucile. 
No, no ! are you blind ? 
Look into your own heart and home. 

Can you see 
No reason for this, save unkindness 

in me ? 
Look into the eyes of your Mife, — 

those true eyes 
Too pure and too honest in aught to 

disguise 
The sweet soul shining through 
them. 

Alfi:ei». 
Lucile ! (first and last 
Be the word, if you will !) let mc 
speak of the past. 



LUCILE. 



103 



I know now, alas ! though I know it 

too late, 
What passed at that meeting which 

settled my fate. 
Nay, nay, interrupt me not yet ! let 

it be ! 
I but say what is due to yourself, — 

due to me, 
And must say it. 

He rushed incoherently on, 
Describing how, lately, the truth he 

had known, 
To explain liow, and whence, he had 

wronged her before, 
AH the complicate coil woimd about 

him of yore. 
All the hopes that had flown with 

the faith that was fled, 
" And then, O Lucile, what was left 

me," he said, 
"When my life was defrauded of 

you, but to take 
That life, as 'twas left, and endeavor 

to make 
Unobserved by another, the void 

which remained 
Unconcealed to myself ? If I have 

not attained, 
I have striven. One word of un- 

kindness has never 
Passed my lips to Matilda. Her least 

wish has ever 
Received my submission. And if, of 

a truth, 
I have failed to renew what I felt in 

my youth, 
I at least have been loyal to what I 

do feel. 
Respect, duty, honor, affection. Lu- 
cile, 
I speak not of love now, nor love's 

long regret : 
I would not offend you, nor dare I 

forget 
The ties that are roi;nd me. But 

may there not be 
A friendship yet hallowed between 

you and me ? 
May we not be yet friends, — friends 

the dearest?" 

"Alas!" 



She replied, "for one moment, per- 
chance, did it pass 

Through my own heart, that dream 
which forever hath brought 

To those who indulge it in innocent 
thought 

So fatal and evil a waking ! But 
no. 

For in lives such as ours are, the 
Dream-tree would grow 

On the borders of Hades : beyond it, 
what lies '? 

The wheel of Ixion, alas ! and the 
cries 

Of the lost and tormented. Depart- 
ed, for us. 

Are the days when with innocence 
we could discuss 

Dreams like these. Fled, indeed, 
are the dreams of ■\ny life ! 

trust me, the best friend you have 

is your wife. 
And I, — in that pure child's pm-e 

virtue, I bow 
To the beauty of virtue. I felt on 

my brow 
Not one blush when I first took her 

hand. With no blush 
Shall I clasp it to-night, when I leave 

you. 

"Hush! hush! 

1 would say what I wished to have 

said when you came. 
Do not think that years leave us and 

find us the same ! 
The woman you knew long ago, long 

ago. 
Is no more. You yourself have 

within you, I know. 
The germ of a joy in the years yet 

to be, 
^Vhcreby the past years will bear 

fruit. As for me, 
I go my own way, — onward, upward ! 
" O yet. 
Let me thank you for that which en- 
nobled regret. 
When it came, as it beautified hope 

ere it fled, — 
The love I once felt for you. True, 

it is dead, 



104 



LUCTLE, 



But it is not corrupted. I too have 

at last 
Lived to learn that love is not — 

(such love as is past, 
Such love as youth dreams of at 

least) — the sole part 
Of life, which is able to fill up the 

heart ; 
Even that of a woman. 

"Between you and me 
Heaven fixes a gulf, over which you 

must see 
That our guardian angels can bear 

us no more. 
We each of us stand on an opposite 

shore. 
Trust a woman's opinion for once. 

Women learn, 
By an instinct men never attain, to 

discern 
Each other's true natures. Matilda 

is fair, 
Matilda is young — see her now, sit- 
ting there ! — 
How tenderly fashioned — (O, is she 

not ? say, J 
To love and be loved ! " 



He turned sharply aAvay, — 
"Matilda is yoiJmg, and Matilda is 

fair ; 
Of all that you tell me pray deem me 

aware ; 
But Matilda's a statue, Matilda's a 

child ; 
Matilda loves not — " 

Lucile quietly smiled 
As she answered him : — " Yesterday, 

all that you say 
Might be true ; it is false, Avholly 

false, thougii, to-day." 
" How ? — what mean you ? " 

"I mean that to-day," she re- 
plied. 
" The stalue with life has become 

vivified : 
I mean that the child to a woman 

has grown : 
And that woman is jealous." 

" What ! she ? " with a tone 



Of ironical wonder, he answered— 

" what, she ! 
She jealous ! — Matilda ! — of whom, 
pray ? — not me ! " 

"My lord, you deceive yourself ; no 

one but you 
Is she jealous of. Trust me. And 

thank Heaven, too. 
That so lately this passion within 

her hath grown. 
For who shall declare, if for months 

she had known 
What for days she has known all too 

keeni} , I fear. 
That knowledge perchance might 

have cost you more dear ? " 
" Explain ! explain, madam ! " he 

cried in surprise ; 
And terror and anger enkindled his 

eyes. 

" How blind are you men ! " she re- 
plied. " ('an j"ou doubt 

That a woman, young, fair, and neg- 
lected — " 

"Speak out!" 

He gasped with emotion. " Lucile I 
you mean — what ? 

Do you doubt her fidelity ? " 

" Certainly not. 

Listen to me, my fi-iend. What I 
wish to explain 

Is so hard to shape forth. I could 
almost refrain 

From touching a subject so fragile. 
However, ' [endeavor 

Bear with me awhile, if I frankly 

To invade for one moment your in- 
nermost life. 

Your honor. Lord Alfred, and that 
of your wife, 

Are dear to me, — most dear ! And 
I am convinced 

That you rashly are risking that 
honor." 

He winced. 

And turned pale, as she spoke. 

She had aimed at his heart, 

And she saw, by his sudden and ter- 
rified start, 



LUCILE. 



I OS 



That her aim had not missed. 

"Stay, Lucile !" he exclaimed, 

"What in trutli do you mean by 
tliese words, vaguely framed 

To alarm me '? Matilda ? — My 
wife ? — do you know ? " — 

"I know that j'our wife is as spot- 
less as snow. 

But I know not how far your con- 
tinued neglect 

Her nature, as well as her heart, 
might affect. 

Till at last, by degrees, that serene 
atmosphere 

Of her unconscious purity, faint and 
yet clear, 

Like the indistinct golden and vapor- 
ous llcece 

Which surroiuided and hid the celes- 
tials in Greece ■ 

From tlie glances of men, woidd dis- 
perse and depart 

At the sighs of a sick and delirious 
heart, — 

For jealousy is to a woman, be sure, 

A disease healed too oft by a crimi- 
nal cure ; 

And the heart left too long to its 
ravage, in time 

May find weakness in virtue, reprisal 
in crime." 



"Such tlioughts could have never," 
he faltered, " I know, 

Beached the heart of Matilda." 

"Matilda? O no ! 

But reflect ! when such thoughts do 
not come of themselves 

To the heart of a Moman neglected, 
like elves 

That seek lonely places, — there rare- 
ly is wanting 

Some voice at her side, with an evil 
enchanting 

To conjure them to her." 

"O lady, beware ! 

At this moment, around me I search 
eveiy where 

For a clew to yoiu- words " — 

" You mistake them," she said. 



Half fearing, indeed, the effect they 

had made. 
" I was putting a mere hypothetical 

case." 

With a long look of trouble he gazed 

in lier face. 
" Woe to him, . . ." he exclaimed 

. . . • ■ woe to him tliat shall feel 
Such a hope ! for 1 swear, if lie did 

but reveal 
One glimpse, — it should be the last 

hope of his life ! " 
The clenched hand and bent eyo- 

broM' betokened the strife 
She had roused in his heart. 

■' You forget," she began, 
" That you menace yourself. You 

yoiu'self are the man 
That is guilty. Alas ! must it ever 

be so ? 
Do we stand in our own light, wher- 
ever we go, ^ 
And fight our own shadows forever ? 

O think ! 
The trial from which you, the 

stronger ones, shrink. 
You ask woman, the weaker one, 

still to endure ; 
You bid lier be true to the laws you 

abjure ; 
To abide by the ties you yourselves 

rend asunder. 
With the force that has failed you ; 

and that, too, when under 
The assimiption of rights which to 

her you refuse. 
The immunity claimed for your- 
selves you abuse ! 
Where the contract exists, it in- 
volves obligation 
To both husband and wife, in an 

equal relation. 
You imloose, in asserting your own 

liberty, 
A knot, which, unloosed, leaves 

another as free. 
Then, O Alfred ! be juster at heart 1 

and thank Heaven 
That Heaven to your wife such a 

nature has given 



io6 



LUCILE. 



That you have not wherewith to re- 
proach her, albeit 

You have cause to reproach your 
own self, could you see it ! " 



In the silence that followed the last 

word she said, 
In the heave of his chest, and the 

droop of his head, 
Poor Lucile marked her words had 

sufficed to impart 
A new germ of motion and life to 

th'at heart 
Of which he himself had so recently 

spoken 
As dead to emotion, — exhausted, or 

broken ! 
New fears would awaken new hopes 

in his life. 
In the husband indifferent no more 

to the wife 
■She already, as she had foreseen, 

could discover 
That Matilda had gained, at her 

hands, a new lover. 
So after some moments of silence, 

whose spell 
They both felt, she extended her 

hand to him. . . . 



"Well?" 



VIII. 



" Lucile," he replied, as that soft 

quiet hand 
In his own he clasped warmly, " I 

botli understand 
And obey you." 

*' Thank Heaven ! " she murmur- 
ed. 

" O yet, 
One word, I beseech you 1 I cannot 

forget." 
He exclaimed, " we are parting for 

life. You have shown 
My pathway to me : but say, what 

is your own ? " 
The calmness with which imtil then 

she had spoken 



In a moment seemed strangely and 

suddenly broken. 
She turned from him nervously, hur- 
riedly. 

" Nay, 
I know not," she murmured, "I 

follow the way 
Heaven leads me ; I cannot foresee 

to what end. 
I know only that far, far away it 

must tend 
From all places in which we have 

met, or might meet. 
Far away ! — onward — upward ! " 

A smile strange and sweet 
As the incense tliat rises from some 

sacred cup 
And mixes with music, stole forth, 

and breathed up 
Her whole face, with those words. 

" Wheresoever it be, 
May all gentlest angels attend you ! " 

sighed he, 
"And bear my heart's blessing wher- 



ever you are 



\ " 



And her hand, with emotion, he 
kissed. 

IX. 

From afar 
Tliat kiss was, alas ! by Matilda be- 
held 
With far other emotions : her young 

bosom swelled. 
And her young cheek with anger was 
crimsoned. 

The Duke 
Adroitly attracted towards it her 

. look 
By a faint but significant smile. 

X. 

Much ill-construed. 
Renowned Bishop Berkeley has ful- 
ly, for one, strewed 
With arguments page upon page to 
teach folks [a hoax. 

That the world they inhabit is only 
But it surely is hard, since we can't 

do without them, 
That our senses should make us so 
oft wish to doubt them ! 



LUCILE. 



107 



CANTO III. 



When first the red savage called 

Man strode, a king, 
Through the wilds of creation, — the 

very first thing 
That his naked intelligence taught 

him to feel 
Was the shame of himself ; and the 

wisli to conceal 
Was the first step in art. From the 

apron which Eve 
In Eden sat down out of fig-leaves 

to weave. 
To the furbelowed floimce and the 

broad crinoline 
Of my lady . . . you all know of 

course whom I mean . . . 
This art of concealment has greatly 

increased. 
A whole world lies cryptic in each 

liimian breast ; 
And that drama of passions as old 

as the hills, 
Which the moral of all men in each 

man fulfils, 
Is only revealed now and then to 

om- eyes 
In the newspaper-files and the com*ts 

of assize. 



In the group seen so lately in sun- 
light assembled, 

'Mid those walks over which the la- 
burnum-bough trembled, 

And the deep-bosomed lilac empara- 
dising 

The haimts where the blackbird and 
thrush flit and sing, 

The keenest eye could but have seen, 
and seen only, 

A circle of friends, minded not to 
leave lonely 

The bird on the bough, or the bee on 
the blossom ; 

Conversing at ease in the garden's 
green bosom, 

Like those who, when Florence was 
yet in her glories, 



Cheated death and killed time with 

Boccaccian stories. 
But at length the long twilight more 

deeply grew shaded, 
And the fair night the rosy horizon 

invaded. 
And the bee in the blossom, the bird 

on the bough, 
Through the shadowy garden were 

slumbering now. 
The trees only, o'er every unvisited 

walk, [talk. 

Began on a sudden to whisper and 
And, as each little sprightly and 

garrulous leaf 
Woke up with an evident sense of 

relief, 
They all seemed to be saying . . . 

" Once more we're alone. 
And, thank Heaven, those tiresome 

people are gone ! " 



Through the deep blue concave of 
the luminous air. 

Large, loving, and languid, the stars 
here and there, 

Like the eyes of shy passionate wo- 
men, looked down 

O'er the dim world whose sole ten- 
der light was their own. 

When Matilda, alone, from her 
chamber descended, 

And entered the garden, unseen, 
unattended. 

Her forehead was aching and parch- 
ed, and her breast 

By a vague inexpressible sadness op- 
pressed ; 

A sadness which led her, she scarcely 
knew how, 

And she scarcely knew why .... 
(save, indeed, that just now 

The house, out of which with a gasp 
she had fled 

Half-stifled, seemed ready to sink on 
her head) . . . 

Out into the night air, the silence, 
the bright 

Boundless starlight, the cool isola- 
tion of night 1 



log 



LUCILE. 



Her husband that day had looked 

once in her face, 
And pressed both her hands in a 

silent embrace, 
And reproachfully noticed her re- 
cent dejection 
With a smile of kind wonder and 

tacit aifection. 
He, of late so indifferent and listless ! 

... at last 
Was he startled and awed by the 

change which had passed 
O'er the once radiant face of his 

young wife ? AVlience came 
That long "look of solicitous fond- 
ness ? . . . the same 
Look and language of quiet affection, 

— the look 
And the language, alas ! wliicli so 

often she took 
For pure love in the simple repose 

of its purity, — 
Her own heart thus lulled to a fatal 

security ! 
Ha ! would he deceive her again by 

this kindness ? 
Had she been, then, O fool ! in her 

innocent blindness 
The sport of transparent illusion ? 

ah, folly ! 
And that feeling, so tranquil, so hap- 
py, so holy. 
She had taken, till then, in the 

heart, not alone 
Of her husband, but also, indeed, in 

her own. 
For true love, nothing else, after all, 

did it prove 
But a friendship profanely familiar ? 
" And love ? . . . 
What was love, then ? . . . not calm, 

not secure, — scarcely kind ! 
But in one, all intensest emotions 

combined : 
Life and death : pain and rapture." 
Thus wandering astray. 
Led by doubt, through the darkness 

she wandered away. 
All silently crossing, recrossing the 

night, Llight, 

With faint, meteoric, miraculous 



The swift-shooting stars through the 

iniinite burned, 
And into the infinite ever returned. 
And silently o'er the obscure and 

unknown 
In the heart of Matilda there darted 

and shone 
Thoughts, enkindling like meteors 

the deeps, to expire, 
Leaving traces behind them of 

tremulous fire. 
IV. 

She entered that arbor of lilacs, in 

which 
The dark air with odors hung heavy 

and rich, 
Like a soul that grows faint with 

desire. ' 

'Twas the place 
In which she so lately had sat, face 

to face 
With her husband, — and her, the 

pale stranger detested. 
Whose presence her heart like a 

plague had infested. 
The -whole spot with evil remem- 
brance was haunted. 
Through the darkness there rose on 

the heart Avhich it daunted 
Each dreary detail of that desolate 

day, 
So full, and yet so mconlplete. Far 

away 
The acacias were muttering, like 

mischievous elves. 
The whole story over again to them- 
selves. 
Each word, — and each word was a 

wound ! By degrees 
Her memory mingled its voice with 

the trees. 

V. 
Like the whisper Eve heard, when 

she paused by the root 
Of the sad tree of knowledge, and 

gazed on its f laxit, 
To 11 n' heart of Matilda the trees 

seemed to hiss 
Wild instructions, revealing man's 

last right, which is 



The right of reprisals. 

An image uncertain, 
And vague, dimly shaped itself forth 

on the curtaiu 
Of the darkness around her. It 

came, and it went ; 
Through her senses a faint sense of 

peril it sent : 
It passed and repassed her ; it went 

and it came 
Forever returning ; forever the same ; 
And forever more clearly defined ; 

till her eyes 
In. that outline obscure could at. last 

recognize 
The man to whose image, the more 

and the more 
That her heart, now aroused from 

its calm sleep of yore, 
From her husband detached itself 

slowly, with pain. 
Her thoughts had returned, and re- 
turned to, again, [law, — 
As though by some secret indefinite 
The vigilant Frenchman, — Eugene 

de Luvois ! 



VI. 



She 



A light sound behind her, 

trembled. By some 
Night-witchcraft her vision a fact 

had become. 
On a sudden she felt, without turn- 
ing to view. 
That a man was approaching behind 

her. She knew 
By the fluttering pulse which she 

could not restrain. 
And the quick-beating heart, that 

this man was Eugene. 
Her first instinct was flight ; but she 

felt her slight foot 
As heavy as though to the soil it had 

root. 
And the Duke's voice retained her, 

like fear in a dream. 

VII. 

"Ah, lady! in life there are meet- 
ings which seem 

Like a fate. Dare I think like a 
sympathy too ? 



Yet what else can I bless for tliis 
vision of you ? 

Alone with my thoughts, on this 
starllghted lawn. 

By an instinct resistless, I felt my- 
self drawn 

To revisit the memories left in the 
place 

Where so lately this evening I look- 
ed in your face. 

And I find, — you, yourself, — my own 
dream ! 

" Can there be 

In this world one thought common 
to you and to me ? 

If so, ... I, who deemed but a mo- 
ment ago 

My heart uncompanioned, save only 
by woe, 

Should indeed be more blessed than 
I dare to believe — 

Ah, but one word, but one from your 
lips to receive '' . . . 

Interrupting him quickly, she mur- 
mured, " I sought, 
Here, a nioment of solitude, silence, 

and thought. 
Which I needed." . . . 

"Lives solitude only for one ? 
Must its charm by my presence so 

soon be undone ? 
Ah, cannot two share it ? What 

needs it for this ? — 
The same thought in both hearts, — 

be it sorrow or bliss ; 
If my heart be the reflex of yours, 

lady, — you, 
Are you not yet alone, — even though 

we be two ?" 

" For that," . . . said Matilda, . . . 
" needs were, you should read 

-What I have in my heart." . . . 

" Think you, lady, indeed, 

Tou are yet of that age when a wo- 
man conceals 

In her heart so completely whatever 
she feels 

From the heart of the man whom it 
interests to know 



no 



LUCILE. 



And find out what that feeUng may 

be ? Ah, not so, 
Lady Alfred ! Forgive me that in it 

I look, 
But I read in your heart as I read in 

a book." 

" Well, Duke ! and what read you 
within it ? xmless 

It be, of a truth, a profomid weari- 
ness, 

And some sadness ?" 

" No doubt. To all facts there are 
laws. 

The effect has its cause, and I mount 
to the cause." 

VIII. 

Matilda shrank back ; for she sud- 
denly foimd 

That a finger was pressed on the yet 
bleeding wound 

She herself had but that day pei-- 
ceived in her breast. 

"You are sad,". . . said the Duke 

(aiid that finger yet pressed 
With a cruel fiersistence the wound 

it made bleed) — 
" You are sad, Lady Alfred, because 

the first need 
Of a young and a beautiful woman is 

to be 
Beloved, and to love. You are sad ; 

for you see 
That you are not beloved, as you 

deemed that you were : 
You are sad : for that knowledge 

hath left you aware 
That you have not yet loved, though 

you thought that you had. 
Yes, yes ! . . . you are sad — because 

knowledge is sad !" 
He could not have read more pro- 
foundly her heart. 
"What gave you," she cried, with a 

terrified stai't, 
" Such strange power ? " . . . 
"To read in your thoughts ? " he 

exclaimed, 
" O lady, — a love, deep, profound, — 

be it blamed 



Or rejected, — a love, true, intense, — 

such, at least, 
As you, and you only, could wake in 

my breast ! " 

"Hush, hush ! . . . I beseech you . . . 

for pity ! " she gasped, 
Snatching hurriedly from him the 

hand he had clasped 
In her effort instinctive to fly from 

the spot. 

" For pity?" ... he echoed, "for 

pity ! and what 
Is the pity you owe him ? his pity for 

you ! 
He, the lord of a life, fresh as new- 
fallen dew ! 
The guardian and guide of a woman, 

young, fair. 
And matchless ! (whose happiness 

did he not swear 
To cherish through life ?) he neg- 

* lects her — for whom ? 
For a fairer than she ? No ! the rose 

in the bloom 
Of that beauty which, even when 

hidden, can prevail 
To keep sleepless with song the 

aroused nightingale. 
Is not fairer ; for even in the pure 

world of flowers 
Her symbol is not, and this poor 

world of ours 
Has no second Matilda ! For whom? 

Let that pass ! 
'Tis not I, 'tis not you, that can name 

her, alas ! 
And /dare not question or judge her. 

But why, 
Why cherish the cause of your own 

misery ? 
Why think of one, lady, who thinks 

not of you ? 
Wliy be bound by a chain which him- 
self he breaks through ? 
And why, since you have but to 

stretch forth you hand, 
Tha love which you need and deserve 

to command, 
I Why shrink ? Why repel it ? " 



LUCILE. 



"Ohush, sir ! O hush !" 
^ried Matilda, as thougli her whole 

heart were one blush. 
" Cease, cease, I conjure you, to 

trouble my life ! 
I8 not Alfred your friend ? and am I 

not his wife? " 



*' And have I not, lady," he an- 
swered, . . . "respected 

His rights as a friend, till himself he 
neglected 

Your rights as a wife ? Do you think 
'tis alone 

For three days I have loved you ? 
My love may have grown 

I admit, day by day, since I first felt 
your eyes. 

In watching their tears, and in sound- 
ing your sighs. 

But, O lady ! I loved you before I 
believed 

That your eyes ever wept, or your 
heart ever grieved. 

Then I deemed you were happy — I 
deemed you possessed 

All the love you deserved, — and I 
hid in my breast 

My own love, till this hour — when I 
could not but feel 

Your grief gave me tlie right my 
own grief to reveal ! 

I knew, years ago, of the singular 
power 

Which Lucile o'er your husband pos- 
sessed. Till the hour 

In which he revealed it himself, did 
I,— say !— 

By a word, or a look, such a secret 
betray ? 

No ! no ! do me justice. I never 
have spoken 

Of this poor heart of mine, till all 
ties he had broken 

Which bound your heart to him. 
And now — now, tliat his love 

For another hath left your own heart 
free to rove, 

What is it, — even now, — that I kneel 
to implore you ? 



Only this, Lady Alfred ! ... to let 

me adore you 
Unblamed : to have' confidence in 

me : to spend 
On me not one thought, save to think 

me your friend. 
Let me speak to you, — ah, let me 

speak to yoii still ! 
Hush to silence my words in your 

heart, if you Mill. 
I ask no response : I ask only your 

leave 
To live yet in your life, and to grieve 

when you grieve ! " 



"Leave me, leave me !" . . . she 

gasped, M'ith a voice thick and 

low 
From emotion. " For pity's sake, 

Duke, let me go ! 
I feel that to blame we should both 

of us be. 
Did I linger." 

" To blame ? yes, no doubt ! " . . . 

answered he, 
" If the love of your husband, in 

bringing you peace, 
Had forbidden you hope. But he 

signs your release 
By the hand of another. One mo- 
ment ! but one ! 
Who knows when, alas ! 1 may see 

you alone 
As to-night I have seen you I or 

when we may meet 
As to-night we have met ? when, en- 
tranced at yoxir feet. 
As in this blessed hour, I may ever 

avow 
The thoughts which are pining for 

utterance now !" 
"Duke! Duke!" . . . she exclaimed 

..." for heaven's sake let me 

go! 
It is late. In the house they will 

miss me, I know. 
We must not be seen here together. 

The night 
Is advancing. I feel overwhelmed 

with affright 1 



It is time to return to my lord." 

" To your lord ? " 

He repeated, with lingering reproach 
on the word, 

" To your lord ? do you think he 
awaits you, in trutli ? 

Is he anxiously missing your pres- 
ence, forsooth ? 

Return to your lord ! . . his restraint 
to renew ? 

And hinder the glances which are 
not for you ? 

No, no ! ... at this moment his 
looks seek the face 

Of another ! another is there in your 
place ! 

Another consoles him ! another re- 
ceives 

The soft speech which from silence 
your absence relieves !" 

XI. 

"You mistake, sir !" . . . responded 
a voice, calm, severe, 

And sad, . . . "You mistake, sir! 
that other is here." 

Eugene and Matilda both started. 

"Lucile !" 

With a half -stifled scream, as she felt 
herself reel 

From the place where she stood, 
cried Matilda. 

" Ho, oh ! 

What! eaves-dropping, madam?" 
. . . the Duke cried . . . "And 
so 

You were listening ? " 

"Say, rather," she said, "that I 
heard, 

Without wishing to hear it, that in- 
famous word, — 

Heard — and therefore reply." 

"Belle Comtesse." said the Duke, 

With concentrated wrath in the sav- 
age rebuke, 

Which betrayed that he felt himself 
baffled . . . " you know 

That your place is not here." 

" Duke," she answered him slow, 

" My place is wherever my duty is 
clear ; 



And therefore my place, at this mo- 
ment, is here. 

lady, this morning my place was 

beside 
Your husband, because (as she said 
this she sighed) 

1 felt that from folly fast growing 

to crime — 
The crime of self-blindness — Heaven 

yet spared me time 
To save for the love of an innocent 

wife 
All that such love deserved in the 

heart and the life 
Of the man to whose heart and whose 

life you alone 
Can with safety confide the pure 

trust of your own." 

She turned to Matilda, and lightly 

laid on her 
Her soft, quiet hand . . . 

" 'Tis, O lady, the honor 
Which that man has confided to you, 

tliat, in spite 
Of his friend, I now trust I may yet 

save to-night — 
Save for both of you, lady ! for yours 

I revere ; 
Due dc Luvois, what say you ? — my 

place is not here ? " 



And, so saying, the hand of Matilda 

she caught, 
Wound one arm round her waist un- 
resisted, and sought 
Gently, softly, to draw lier away 

from tlie spot. 
The Duke stood confounded, and 

followed them not. 
But not yet the house had they 

reached when Lucile 
Her tender and delicate burden could 

feel 
Sink and falter beside her. O, then 

she knelt down, 
Flung her arms round Matilda, and 

pressed to her own 
The poor bosom beating against her. 



tUCILE. 



113 



The moon, 
Bright:, breathless, and buoyant, and 

brimful of June, 
Floated up from the hillside, sloped 

over the vale. 
And poised herself loose in mid- 
heaven, with one pale. 
Minute, scintillesccnt, and tremu- 
lous star 
Swinging under her globe like a 

wizard-lit car, 
Thus to each of those women reveal- 
ing the face 
Of the other. Each bore on her 

featm-cs the trace 
Of a vivid emotion. A deep inward 

shame 
The cheek of Matilda had flooded 

with flame. 
With lier enthusiastic emotion, Lu- 

cile 
Ti'embled visibly yet ; for she could 

not but feel 
That a heavenly hand was upon her 

that night. 
And it touched her pure brow to a 

heavenly light. 
" In the name of your husband, dear 

lady,'' she said ; 
" In the name of your mother, take 

heart ! Lift yoiir head, 
For those blushes are noble. Alas ! 

do not trust 
To that maxim of virtue made ashes 

and dust. 
That the fault of the husband can 

cancel the wife's. 
Take heart ! and take refuge and 

strength in your life's 
Pure silence, — there, Icneel, pray, 

and hope, weep, and wait ! " 
"Saved, Lucile ! " sobbed Matilda, 

" but saved to what fate ? 
Tears, prayers, yes 1 not hopes." 

" Hush ! " the sweet voice replied. 
"Fooled away by a fancy, again to 

your side 
Must your husband return. Doubt 

not this. And return 
For the love you can give, with the 

love that you yearn 



To receive, lady. Wliat was it chilled 
you both now ? 

jS'ot the absence of love, but the ig- 
norance how 

Love is nourished by love. Well ! 
henceforth you will prove 

Your heart worthy of love, — since it 
knoM^s how to love." 



" What gives you such power over 

me, that I feel 
Thus drawn to obey you ? What are 

you, Lucile ? " 
Sighed Matilda, and lifted her eyes 

to the face 
Of Lucile. 
There passed suddenly through it 

the trace 
Of deep sadness ; and o'er that fair 

forehead came down 
A shadow which yet was too sweet 

for a frown, 
■'The pupil of sorrow, perchance" 

. . . she replied. 
"Of sorrow?" Matilda exclaimed 

. . . " O confide 
To my heart your affliction. In all 

you made known 
I should find some instruction, no 

doubt, for my own ! " 

"And I some consolation, no doubt ; 

for the tears 
Of another have not flowed for me 

many years." 

It was then that Matilda herself 

seized the hand 
Of Lucile in her own, and uplifted 

her ; and 
Thus together they entered the house 



'Twas the room 
Of Matilda. 

The languid and delicate gloom 
Of a lamp of pure white alabaster, 

aloft 
From the ceiling suspended, around 
it slept soft. 



114 



LUCILE. 



The casement oped into the garden. 
The pale 

Cool moonlight streamed through it. 
One lone nightingale 

Sung aloof in the laurels. 

And here, side by side, 

Hand in hand, the two women sat 
down undescried. 

Save by guardian angels. 

As, when, sparkling yet 

From the rain, that, with drops that 
are jewels, leaves wet 

The bright head it humblefe, a young 
rose inclines 

To some pale lily near it, the fair 
vision shines 

As one flower with two faces, in 
hushed, tearful speech, 

Like the showery whispers of flow- 
ers, each to each 

Linked, and leaning together, so lov- 
ing, so fair, 

So united, yet diverse, the two wo- 
men there 

Looked, indeed, like two flowers 
upon one drooping stem, 

In the soft light that tenderly rested 
on them. 

All that soul said to soul in that 
chamber, who knows ? 

All that heai't gained from heart ? 

Leave the lily, the rose, 

Undistiu-bed with their secret within 
them. For who 

To the heart of the floweret can fol- 
low the dew ? 

A night full of stars ! O'er the si- 
lence, unseen, 

The footsteps of sentinel angels, be- 
tween 

The dark land and deep sky were 
moving. You heard 

Passed from earth up to heaven the 
happy watchword 

Which brightened the stars as 
amongst them it fell 

Fi'om earth's heart, which it eased 
. . . " All is well 1 all is well!" 



CANTO IV. 
I. 

The Poets povir wine ; and, when 
'tis new, all decry it, 

But, once let it be old, every trifler 
must try it. 

And Polonius, who praises no wine 
that's not Massic, 

Complains of my verse, that my verse 
is not classic. 

And Miss Tilburina, who sings, and 
not badly. 

My earlier verses, sighs " Common- 
place sadly ! " 

As for you, O Polonius, you vex me 

but slightly ; 
But you, Tilburina, your eyes beam 

so brightly 
In despite of their languishing looks, 

on my word. 
That to see you look cross I can 

scarcely afford. 
Yes ! the silliest woman that smiles 

on a bard 
Better far than Longinus himself 

can reward 
The appeal to her feelings of which 

she approves ; 
And the critics I most care to please 

are the Loves. 

Alas, friend ! what boots it, a stone 
at his head 

And a brass on his breast, — when a 
man is once dead ? 

Ay ! were fame the sole guerdon, 
poor guerdon were then 

Theirs who, stripping life bare, stand 
forth models for men. 

The reformer's ? — a creed by poster- 
ity learnt 

A century after its author is burnt I 

The poet's ?— a laurel that hides the 
bald brow 

It hath blighted ! The painter's ?— 
ask Raphael now 

"Which Madonna's authentic I The 
statesman's ? — a name 

For parties to blacken, or boys to do- 
claim ! 



LUCILE. 



"5 



The soldier's ? — three lines on the 
cold Abbey pavement ! 

Were this all the life of the wise and 
the brave meant, 

All it ends in, thrice better, Neasra, 
it were 

Unregarded to sport with thine odor- 
ous hair, 

Untroubled to lie at thy feet in the 
shade 

And be loved, while the roses yet 
bloom overhead. 

Than to sit by the lone hearth, and 
thinlv the long thought, 

A severe, sad, blind schoolmaster, 
envied for naught 

Save the name of John Milton ! For 
all men, indeed, 

Who in some choice edition may 
graciously read. 

With fair illustration, and erudite 
note. 

The song which the poet in bitter- 
ness wrote, 

Beat the poet, and notably beat him, 
in this — 

The joy of the genius is theirs, whilst 
tbey miss 

The grief of the man : Tasso's song, 
— not his madness ! 

Dante's dreams, — not his waking to 
exile and sadness ! 

Milton's music, — but not Milton's 
blindness ! . . . 

Yet rise, 

My Milton, and answer, with those 
noble eyes 

Which the glory of heaven hath 
blinded to earth ! 

Say — the life, in the living it, savors 
of worth : 

That the deed, in the doing it, 
reaches its aim : 

That the fact has a value apart from 
the fame : 

That a deeper delight, in the mere 
labor, pays 

Scorn of lesser delights, and labori- 
ous days : 

And Shakespeare, though all Shake- 
speare's writings were lost, 



And his genius, though never a trace 
of it crossed 

Posterity's path, not the less would 
have dwelt 

In the isle with Miranda, with Ham- 
let have felt 

All that Hamlet hath uttered, and 
haply where, pure 

On its death-bed, wronged Love lay, 
have moaned with the Moor ! 



When Lord Alfred that night to the 

salon returned 
He found it deserted. The lamp 

dimly burned 
As though half out of humor to find 

itself there 
Forced to light for no purpose a room 

that was bare. 
He sat down by the window alone. 

Never yet 
Did the heavens a lovelier evening 

beget 
Since Latona's bright childbed that 

bore the new moon ! 
The dark world lay still, in a sort of 

sweet swoon. 
Wide open to heaven ; and the stars 

on the stream 
Were trembling like eyes that are 

loved on the dream 
Of a lover ; and all things were glad 

and at rest 
Save the unquiet heart in his own 

troubled breast. 
He endeavored to think, — an un- 
wonted employment, 
Which appeared to afford him no 

sort of enjoyment. 



"Withdraw into yourself. But, if 

peace you seek there for, 
Yolu: reception, beforehand, be sure 

to prepare for," 
Wrote the tutor of Nero ; who wrote, 

be it said. 
Better far than he acted, — but peace 

to the dead ! 



ii6 



LUCILE. 



He bled for his pupil : what more 

could he do ? 
But Lord Alfred, when into liimself 

he withdrew, 
Found all there in disorder. For 

more than an hour 
He sat with his head drooped like 

some stubborn floM-er 
Beaten down by the rush of the rain, 

— with such force 
Did the thick, gushing thoughts hold 

ujjon him tlie course 
Of their sudden descent, rapid, rush- 
ing, and dim. 
From the cloud that had darkened 

the evening for him. 
At one moment he rose, — rose and 

opened tlie door, 
And wistfully looked down tne dark 

corridor 
Toward the room of Matilda. Anon, 

with a sigh [quietly 

Of an incomplete purpose, he crept 
Back again to his place in a sort of 

submission 
To doubt, and returned to his former 

position, — 
That loose fall of the arms, that dvdl 

droop of the face. 
And the eye vaguely fixed on impal- 
pable space. 
, The dream, which till then had been 

! lulling his life, 

As once Circe tlie winds, had sealed 

thought ; and his wife 
And his home for a time he had 
» quite, like Ulysses, 

(Forgotten ; but now o'er the troubled 
abysses [forth leapt 

Of the spirit within him, ceolian, 
To their freedom new-found, and re- 

sistlessly swept 
All his heart into tumult, the 

thoughts which had been 
Long pent up in their mystic recesses 
unseen. 

IV. 

How long he thus sat there, himself 

he knew not, 
Till he started, as though he were 

suddenly shot, 



To the sound of a voice too familiar 
to doubt, 

Which was making some noise in the 
passage without. 

A sound English voice, with a I'ound 
English accent. 

Which the scared German echoes re- 
sentfully back sent ; 

The complaint of a much disappoint- 
ed cab-driver 

Mingled with it, demanding some 
ultimate stiver : 

Then, the heavy and hurried ap- 
proach of a boot 

Which revealed by its sound no di- 
minutive foot : 

And the door was flung suddenly 
open, and on 

The thresliold Lord Alfred by bach- 
elor Jolm 

Was seized in that sort of affection- 
ate rage or 

Frenzy of hugs which some stout 
Ursa Major 

On some lean Ursa Minor would 
doubtless bestow 

With a warmth for which only star- 
vation and snow 

Could render one grateful. As soon 
as he coidd, 

Lord Alfred contrived to escape, nor 
be food 

Any more for those somewhat vora- 
cious embraces. 

Then the two men sat down and 
scanned each other's faces ; 

And Alfred could see that his cousin 
was taken 

With unwonted emotion. The hand 
that had shaken 

His own trembled somewhat. In 
truth he descried, 

At a glance, somethiug wrong. 
V. 
" What's the matter ? " he cried. 

" What have you to tell me ?" 

John. 
What ! have you not heard? 
Alfked. 
Heard what ? 



LUCILE. 



i'7 



John. 
This sad business — 
Alfked. 

I ? no, not a word. 

Joux. 
You received my last letter ? 
Alfred. 

I think so. If not, 
What then ? 

John. 
You have acted upon it ? 
Alfred. 

On what ? 

JOHX. 

The advice that I gave you — 
Alfred. 

Advice ? — let me see ! 
You alvHiys are giving advice, Jack, 

to me. 
About Parliament was it ? 

JOHX. 

Hang Parliament ! no, 
The Bank, the Bank, Alfred ! 

Alfred. 

What Bank ? 

John. 

Heavens ! I know 

You are careless ; — but surely you 

liave not forgotten, — 
Or neglected ... I warned you the 

whole thing was rotten. 
You have drawn those deposits at 
least ? 

Alfred. 

No, I meant 
To have written to-day ; but the 

note shall be sent 
To-morrow, however. 

John. 
To-morrow ? too late ! 
Too late ! O, what devil bewitched 
you to wait ? 



Alfred. 
Mercy save us ! you don't mean to 
say . . , 

John. 

Yes, I do. 
Alfred. 
What ! Sir Ptidley ? . . . 
John. 
Smashed, broken, blown up,bolted, 
too ! 

Alfred. 
But his own niece ? . . .In heav- 
en's name. Jack . . . 

John. 

O, I told yoix 
The old hypocritical scoundrel 
would . . . 

Alfred. 

Hold ! you 
Surely can't mean we are ruined ? 

John. 

Sit down ! 

A fortnight ago a report about town 

Made me most apijrehensive. Alas, 
and alas ! 

I at once wrote and warned you. 
Well, now let that pass. 

A run on the Bank about five days 
ago 

Confirmed my forebodings too terri- 
bly, though 

I drove down to the city at once : 
found the door 

Of the Bank close : the Bank had 
stopped payment at four. 

Next morning the failure was known 
to be fraud : 

Warrant out for MacNab ; but Mac- 
Nab was abroad : 

Gone — we cannot tell where. I en- 
deavored to get 

Information : have learned nothing 
certain as yet, — 

Not even the way that old Ridley 
was gone : 

Or with those securities what he had 
done : 



ii8 



LUCILE. 



Or whether they had been ah-eady 

called out : 
If they are not, their fate is, I fear, 

past a doubt. 
Twenty families ruined, they say : 

what was left, — 
Unable to find any clew to the cleft 
The old fox ran to earth in, — but 

join you as fast 
As I could, my dear Alfred ? * 



He stopped here, aghast 
At the change in his cousin, the hue 

of wliose face 
Had grown livid ; and glassy his 

eyes fixed on space. 
" Courage, courage ! " . . . said 

John, ..." bear the blow like 

a man !" 
And he caught the cold hand of 

Lord Alfred. There ran 
Through that hand a quick tremor. 

"I bear it," he said, 
" But Matilda ? the blow is to her ! " 

And his head 
Seemed forced down, as he said it. 

John. 

Matilda ? Pooh, pooh ! 

I half think I know the girl better 
than you. 

She has courage enough — and to 
spare. She cares less 

Than most women for luxiu'y, non- 
sense, and dress, 

Alfbed. 
The fault has" been mine. 



• These events, it is needless to say, Mr. 
Morse, 

Took pl.ace wlion Bad News as yet 
travelled by horse. 

Kre the world, like a cockchafer, buzzed 
on a wire, 

Or Time was calcined by electrical iire ; 

Ere a cable went under the hoary Atlan- 
tic, 

Or the word Telegram drove gramma- 
rians frantic. 



John. 

Be it yours to repair it ; 
If you did not avert, you may help 
her to bear it. 

Alfked, 
I might have averted. 

John. 
Perhaps so. But now 

There is clearly no use in consider- 
ing how, 

Or whence, came the mischief. The 
misclxief is here. 

Broken shins are not mended by cry- 
ing, — that's clear ! 

One has but to rub them, and get up 
again. 

And push on, — and not think too 
much of the pain. 

And at least it is much that you see 
that to her 

You owe too much to think of your- 
self. You must stir 

And arouse yourself, Alfred, for her 
sake. Who knows ? 

Something yet may be saved from 
this wreck. I suppose 

We shall make him disgorge all he 
can, at the least. 

" O Jack, I have been a brute idiot ! 
a beast ! 

A fool ! I have sinned, and to her 
I have sinned ! 

I have been heedless, blind, inex- 
cusably blind ! 

And now, in a flash, I see all 
things ! " 

As though 

To shut out the vision, he bowed his 
head low 

On his hands ; and the great tears 
in silence rolled on, 

And fell momently, heavily, one af- 
ter one. 

John felt no desire to find instant 
relief 

For the trouble he witnessed. 

He guessed, in the grief 

Of his cousin, the brokan and heart- 
felt admission 



LUCILE. 



119 



Of some error demanding a heartfelt 

contrition : 
Some oblivion perchance which could 

plead less excuse 
To the heart of a man re-aroused to 

the use 
Of the conscience God gave him, 

than simply and merely 
The neglect for which now he was 

paying so dearly. 
So he rose without speaking, and 

paced up and down 
The long room, much afflicted, in- 
deed, in his own 
Cordial heart for Matilda. 

Thus, silently lost 
In his anxious reflections, he crossed 

and recrossed 
The place where his cousin yet hope- 
lessly hung 
O'er the table; his fingers entwisted 

among 
The rich curls they were knotting 

and dragging : and there. 
That sound of all sounds the most 

painful to hear. 
The sobs of a man ! Yet so far in 

his own 
Kindly thoughts was he plunged, he 

already had grown 
Unconscious of Alfred. 

And so for a space 
There was silence between them. 



At last, with sad face 

He stopped short, and bent on his 
cousin awhile 

A pained sort of wistful, compassion- 
ate smile, 

Approached him, — stood o'er him, — 
and suddenly laid 

One hand on his shoulder — 

" Where is she ? " he said. 

Alfred lifted his face all disfigxued 
with tears 

And gazed vacantly at him, like one 
that appears 

In some foreign language to hear 
himself greeted. 

Unable to answer. 



" Where is she ? " repeated 

His cousin. 
He motioned his hand to the door; 

"There, I think," he replied. Cou- 
sin John said no more. 

And ajDpeared to relapse to his own 
cogitations. 

Of which not a gestm-e vouchsafed 
indications. 

So again there was silence. 

A timepiece at last 

Struck the twelve strokes of mid- 
night. 

Eoused by them, he cast 

A half-look to the dial; then quietly 
threw 

His arm round the neck of his cousin, 
and drew 

The hands down from his face. 

" It is time she should know 

What has happened," he said, . . . 
" let us go to her now." 

Alfred started at once to his feet. 

Drawn and wan 

Though his face, he looked more 
than his wont was — a man. 

Strong for once, in his weakness. 
Uplifted, filled through 

With a manly resolve. 

If that axiom be true 

Of the " Sum quia cogito," I must 
opine 

That '^ id sum quod coyito": — that 
which, in fine, 

A man thinks and feels, with his 
whole force of thought 

And feeling, the man is himself. 

He had fought 

With himself, and rose up from his 
self-overthrow 

The survivor of much which that 
strife had laid low. 

At his feet, as he rose at the name 
of his wife, life 

Lay in ruins the brilliant unrealized 

Which, though yet mifulfilled, seem- 
ed till then, in that name, 

To be his, had he claimed it. The 
man's dream of fame 

And of power fell shattered before 
him ; and only 



X20 



LUCILE. 



There rested the heart of the woman, 
so lonely 

In all save the love he could give 
her. The lord 

Of that heart he arose. Blush not, 
Muse, to record 

That his first thought, and last, at 
that moment was not 

Of the power and fame that seemed 
lost to his lot. 

But the love that was left to it ; not 
of the pelf 

He had cared for, yet squandered ; 
and not of himself, 

But of ht'r ; as he murmured, 

" One moment, dear Jack ! 

We have grown up from boyhood to- 
gether. Our track 

Has been through the same meadows 
in childhood : in youth 

Through the same silent gateways, 
to manhood. In truth, 

There is none that can know me as 
you do ; and none 

To whom I more wish to believe my- 
self known. 

Speak tlie truth ; you are not wont 
to mince it, I know. 

Nor I, shall I shirk it, or shrink 
from it now. [spite 

In despite of a wanton behavior, in 

Of vanity, folly, and pride, Jack, 
which might 

Have turned from me many a heart 
strong and true 

As your own, I have never turned 
round and missed YOU 

From my side in one hour of afflic- 
tion or doubt 

By my own blind and heedless self- 
will brought about. 

Tell me truth. Do I owe this alone 
to the sake 

Of those old recollections of boyhood 
that make 

In your heart yet some clinging and 
crying api^eal 

From a judgment more harsh, which 
I cannot but feel 

Might have sentenced our friendship 
to death long ago ? 



Or is it . . . (I would I could deem it 
were so !) 

That, not all overlaid by a listless 
exterior. 

Your heart has divined in me some- 
thing superior 

To that which I seem ; from my in- 
nermost nature 

Not wholly expelled by the world's 
usm-pature ? 

Some instinct of earnestness, truth, 
or desire 

For truth ? Some one spark of tlie 
soul's native fire 

Moving under the ashes,and cinders, 
and dust 

Which life hath heaped o'er it ? 
Some one fact to trust 

And to hope in ? Or by you alone 
am I deemed 

The mere frivolous fool I so often 
have seemed 

To my own self ? " 

John. 
No, Alfred ! you will, I believe, 
Be true, at the last, to what now 

makes you grieve 
For having belied your true nature 

so long. 
Necessity is a stern teacher. Be 
strong ! 

"Do you think." he resumed. . . 

*' what I feel while I speak 
Is no more than a transient emotion, 

as wealv 
As these weak tears would seem to 

betoken it ? " 

John. 

No ! 
Alfked. 
Thank you, cousin ! your hand then. 

And now I will go 
Alone, Jack. Trust to me. 

VIII. 

John. 
I do. But 'tis late. 
If she sleeps, you'll not wake her. 



LUCILE. 



Al,FliED. 

No, no ! it will wait 
(Poor infant !) too surely, this mis- 
sion of sorrow ; 
If she sleeps, I will not mar her 

dreams of to-morrow. 
He opened the door, and passed out. 
Cousin John 
Watched him wistful, and left him 
to seek her alone. 

IX. 

His heart beat so loud when he 

knocked at her door, 
He could hear no reply from within. 

Yet once more 
lie knocked lightly. No answer. 

The handle he tried: 
The door opened : he entered the 

room undescried. 



Xi) brighter than is that dim circlet 

of light 
Wliich enhaloes the moon when rains 

form on the night, 
The pale lamp and indistinct radi- 
ance shed 
Round the chaml)er, in which at her 

pure snowy bed 
Matilda was kneeling ; so Avrapt in 

deep prayer 
That she knew not her husband 

stood watching her there. 
With the lamplight the moonlight 

had mingled a faint 
And unearthly effulgence which 

seemed to acquaint 
The whole place M'ith a sense of deep 

peace made secm'e 
By the presence of something an- 
gelic and pure. 
And not purer some angel Grief 

carves o'er the tomb 
AVhere Love lies, than the lady that 

kneeled in that gloom. 
She had put off her dress ; and she 

looked to his eyes 
Like a young soul escaped from its 

earthly disguise ; 



Her fair neck and innocent shoulders 
were bare. 

And over them rippled her soft gol- 
den hair ; 

Her simple and slender white bodice 
unlaced 

Confined not one curve of her deli- 
cate waist. 

As the light that, from water reflect- 
ed, forever 

Trembles up through the tremulous 
reeds of a river, 

So the beam of her beauty went 
trembling in him. 

Through the thoughts it suffused 
with a sense soft and dim, 

Reproducing itself in the broken and 
bright [tions. 

Lapse and pulse of a million eino- 
That sight 

Bowed his heart, bowed his knee. 
Knowing scarce what he did, 

To her side through the chamber he 
silently slid. 

And knelt down beside her, — and 
prayed at her side. 



Upstarting, she then for the first 

lime descried 
That her husband was near her ; 

suffused with the blush 
Which came o'er her soft pallid 

clieek with a gush 
Where the tears spai'kled yet. 

As a young fawn uncouches, 
Shy with fear, from the fern where 

some hunter approaches. 
She shrank back ; he caught her, 

and circling his arm 
Round her waist, on her brow 

pressed one kiss long and 

warm. 
Then her fear changed in impulse ; 

and hiding her face 
On his breast, she hung locked in a 

clinging embrace 
With her soft arms wound heavily 

round him, as though 
She feared, if their clasp were r^-. 

laxed, he would go ; 



122 



LUCILE. 



Her smooth naked shoulders, un- 

caied for, convulsed 
By sob after sob, while her bosom 

yet pulsed 
In its pressm'e on his, as the effort 

within it 
I/ived and died with each tender 

tumultuous minute. 
*' O Alfred, O Alfred I forgive me," 

she cried, — 
" Forgive me !" 
"Forgive 3'ou, my poor child!" 

he sighed ; 
*' But I never have blamed you for 

auglit that I know, 
And I have not one thought that re- 
proaches you now." 
From her arms he unwound himself 

gently. And so 
He forced her down softly beside 

him. Below 
The canopy shading their couch, 

they sat down. 
And he said, clasping firmly her 

hand in his own, 
" When a proud man, Matilda, has 

found out at length, 
That he is but a child in the midst 

of his strength, 
, But a fool in his wisdom, to whom 

cau he own 
The weakness w'hich thus to himself 

hath been shoMai ? 
From whom seek the strength which 

his need of is sore, 
Although in his pride he might 

perish, before 
He could plead for the one, or the 

other avow 
'Mid his intimate friends ? Wife of 

mine, tell me now, 
Do you join me in feeling, in that 

darkened hour. 
The sole friend that can have the 

right or the power 
To be at his side, is the woman that 

shares 
His fate, if he falter ; the woman 

that bears 
The name dear for h'ir sake, and 

hallows the life 



She has mingled her own with, — in 

short, that man's wife !" 
"Yes," murmured Matilda, "O 

yes ! " 

" Then," he cried, 
" This chamber in which we two sit, 

side by side 
(And his arm, as he spoke, seemed 

more softly to press her). 
Is now a confessional, — yoit my con- 
fessor ! " 
" I ?" she faltered, and timidly lift- 
ed her head. 
" Yes ! but first answer one other 

question," he said : 
" When a woman once feels that she 

is not alone ; 
That the heart of another is warmed 

by her own ; 
That another feels with her what- 
ever she feel. 
And halves her existence in woe or 

in weal ; 
That a man for her sake will, so long 

as he lives, 
Live to put forth his strength which 

the thought of her gives ; 
Live to shield her from want, and to 

share with her sorrow ; 
Live to solace the day, and provide 

for the morrow ; 
Will that woman feel less than 

another, O say, 
The loss of what life, sparing this, 

takes away? 
Will she feel (feeling this), when 

calamities come. 
That they brighten the heart, though 

they darken the home ?" 
She turned, like a soft rainy heaven, 

on him 
Eyes that smiled through fresh tears, 

trustful, tender, and dim. 
"That woman," she murmured, 

"indeed were thrice blest !" 
"Then courage, true wife of my 

heart !" to his breast 
As he folded and gathered her 

closely, he cried. 
' ' For the refuge, to-night in these 

arms opened vdde 



LUCILE. 



123 



To your heart, can be never closed to 

it again, 
And this room is for both an asylum ! 

For when 
I passed througli that door, at the 

door I left there [bear. 

A calamity, sudden, and heavy to 
One step from that threshold, and 

daily, I fear, 
We must face it henceforth : but it 

enters not here. 
For that door shuts it out, and 

admits here alone 
A heart which calamity leaves all 

your own ! " 
She started . . . " Calamity, Alfred ! 

to you ? ' ' 
"To both, my poor child, but 'twill 

bring with it too 
The courage, I trust, to subdue it." 
" O speak ! 
Speak ! " she faltered in tones timid, 

anxious, and weak. 
" O yet for a moment," he said, 

" hear me on !" 
Matilda, this morn we went forth in 

the sun. 
Like those children of sunshine, the 

bright summer flies, 
That sport in the sunbeam, and play 

through the skies 
While the skies smile, and heed not 

each other : at last. 
When their sunbeam is gone, and 

their sky overcast, 
Who recks in what ruin they fold 

their wet wings ? 
So indeed the morn found us, — poor 

frivolous things ! 
Now our sky is o'ercast, and our sun- 
beam is set. 
And tlie night brings its darkness 

around us. O, yet. 
Have we weathered no storm through 

those twelve cloudless hours ? 
Yes ; you, too, have wept ! 

" While the world was yet ours, 
Wliile its sun was upon us, its in- 
cense streamed to us. 
And its myriad voices of joy seemed 

to woo us, 



We strayed from each other, too far, 

it may be, [I see, 

Nor, wantonly wandering, then did 
How deep was my need of thee, 

dearest, how great 
Was thy claim on my heart and thy 

share in my fate ! 
But, Matilda, an angel was near us, 

meanwhile, 
Watching o'er us, to warn, and to 

rescue ! 

" That smile 
Which you saw with suspicion, that 

presence you eyed 
With resentment, an angel's they 

were at your side 
And at mine ; nor perchance is the 

day all so far. 
When Ave both in our prayers, when 

most heartfelt they are. 
May murmur the name of that wo- 
man now gone 
From our sight evermore. 

"Here, this evening, alone, 
I seek your forgiveness, in opening 

my heart 
Unto yours, — from this clasp be it 

never to part ! 
Matilda, the fortune you brought me 

is gone. 
But a prize richer far than that for- 
tune has won 
It is yours to confer, and I kneel for 

that prize, 
'Tis the heart of my wife ! " With 

suffused happy eyes 
She sprang from her seat, flung her 

arms wide apart, 
And tenderly closing them round 

him, his heart 
Clasped in one close embrace to her 

bosom ; and there 
Drooped her head on his shoulder ; 

and sobbed. 

Not despair. 
Not sori'ow, not even the sense of 

her loss, 
Flowed in those happy tears, so ob- 
livious she was 
Of all save the sense of her own 

love ! Anon, 



124 



LUCILE. 



However, his words rushed back to 

her. "All gone, 
The fortune you brought me ! " 

And eyes that were dim 
With soft tears she upraised : but 

those tears were for him. 
"Gone! my husband?" she said, 

"tell me all ! see ! I need. 
To sober this rapture, so seltish in- 
deed, 
Fuller sense of affliction.'' 

"Poor innocent child !" 
He kissed her fair forehead, and 

mournfully smiled, 
As he told her the tale he had heard, 

— something more 
The gain found in loss of what gain 

lost of yore. 
" Rest, my heart, and my brain, and 

my right hand for you ; 
And with these, my Matilda, what 

may I not do ? 
You know not, I knew not myself 

till this hour, 
Which so sternly revealed it, my 

nature's full power." 
" And I too," she murmm'ed, " I too 

am no more 
The mere infant at heart you have 

known me before. 
I have suffered since then. I have 

learned much in life. 
O take, with the faith I have pledged 

as a wife, [to feel ! 

The heart I have learned as a woman 
For I — love you, my husband ! " 

As though to conceal 
Less from him, than herself, what 

that motion expressed. 
She dropped her bright head, and hid 

all on his breast. 
" O lovely as woman, beloved as 

wife ! 
Evening star of my heart, light for- 
ever my life ! 
If from eyes iixed too long on this 

base earth thus far 
You have missed your due homage, 

dear guardian star, 
Believe that, uplifting those eyes 

unto heaven, 



There I see you, and know you, and 
bless the light given 

To lead me to life's late achieve- 
ment ; my own. 

My blessing, my treasure, my all 
things in one ! " 



How lovely she looked in the lovely 

moonlight. 
That streamed through the pane from 

the blue balmy night ! 
How lovely she looked in her own 

lovely youth. 
As she climg to his side full of trust, 

and of truth ! 
How lovely to Mm as he tenderly 

pressed 
Her young head on his bosom, and 

sadly caressed 
The glittering tresses which now 

shaken loose 
Showered gold in his hand, as he 

smoothed them ! 

XIII. 

O Muse, 
Interpose not one pulse of thine own 

beating heart 
'Twixt these two silent souls I 

There's a joy beyond art, 
And beyond sound the music it 
inakes in the breast. 
XIV. 

Here were lovers twice wed, that 
were happy at least ! 

I«ro music, save such as the nightin- 
gales sung, 

Breathed their bridals abroad ; and 
no cresset, uphung. 

Lit that festival hour, save what soft 
light was given 

From the pure stars that peopled the 
deep-purple heaven. 

He opened the casement: he led her 
with him. 

Hushed in heart, to the terrace, 
dipped cool in the dim 

Lustrous gloom of the shadowy lau- 
rels. They heard 

Aloof the invisible, rapturous bird, 



LUC I LB. 



125 



With her wild note bewildering the 

woodlands : they saw 
Not unheard, afar off, the hill-rivulet 

draw 
His long ripple of moon-kindled 

wavelets with cheer 
From the throat of the vale ; o'er the 

dark-sapphire sphere 
The mild, multitudinous lights lay- 
asleep. 
Pastured free on the midnight, and 

bright as the sheep 
Of Apollo in pastoral Thrace ; from 

unknown 
Hollow glooms freshened odors 

around them were blown 
Intermittingly ; then the moon 

dropped from their sight. 
Immersed in the mountains, and put 

out the light 
"Which no longer they needed to read 

on the face 
Of each other's life's last revelation. 
The place 
Slept sumptuous round them ; and 

Natare, that never 
Sleeps, but waking reposes, with 

patient endeavor 

Continued about them, unheeded. 

iniseen, [green 

Her old, quiet toil in the heart of the 

Summer silence, preparing new buds 

for new blossoms. 
And stealing a finger of change o'er 

the bosoms 
Of the unconscious woodlands ; and 

Time, that halts not 
His forces, how lovely soever the 

spot 
Where their march lies, — the wary, 

gray strategist. Time, 
With the armies of Life, lay en- 
camped, — Grief and Crime, 
Love and Faith, in the darkness un- 
heeded ; maturing. 
For Ms great Avar with man, new sur- 
prises ; securing 
All outlets, pmrsuing and pushing his 

foe 
To his last narrow refuge, — the 



Sweetly though 

Smiled the stars like new hopes out 
of heaven, and sweetly 

Their hearts beat thanksgiving for 
all things, completely 

Confiding in that yet untrodden ex- 
istence 

Over Avhich they were pausing. To- 
morrow, resistance 

And struggle ; to-night, Love his 
hallowed device 

Hung forth, and proclaimed his 
serene armistice. 



CANTO V. 



When Lucile left Matilda, she sat 
for long hours 

In her chamber, fatigued by long 
overwrought powers, 

'Mid the signs of departure, about to 
turn back 

To her old vacant life, on her old 
homeless track. 

She felt her heart falter within her. 
She sat 

Like some poor player, gazing de- 
jectedly at 

The insignia of royalty worn for a 
night ; 

Exhausted, fatigued, with the dazzle 
and light. 

And the effort of passionate feign- 
ing ; who thinks 

Of her own meagre, i-ush-lighted gar- 
ret, and shrinks 

From the chill of the change that 
awaits her. 

zi. 

From these 

Oppressive, and comfortless, blank 
reveries, 

Unable to sleep, she descended the 
stair 

That led from her room to the gar- 
den. 



126 



LUCILE. 



The air, 

With the chill of the dawn, yet un- 
risen, but at hand, 

Strangely smote on her feverish fore- 
head. The land 

Lay in darkness and change, like a 
world in its grave : 

No sound, save the voice of the long 
river wave, [night ! 

And the crickets that sing all the 
She stood still, 

Vaguely watching the thin cloud that 
curled on the hill. 

Emotions, long pent in her breast, 
were at stir. 

And the deeps of the spirit were 
troubled in her. 

Ah, pale woman ! what, with that 
heart-broken look. 

Didst thou read then in nature's 
weird heart-breaking book ? 

Have the wild rains of heaven a 
father ? and who 

Hath in pity begotten the drops of 
the dew ? 

Orion, Arcturus, who pilots them 
both ? 

What leads forth in his season the 
bright Mazaroth ? 

Hath the darkness a dwelling, — save 
there, in those eyes ? 

And what name hath that half-re- 
vealed hope in the skies ? 

Ay, question, and listen ! What an- 
swer ? 

The sound 

Of the long river wave through its 
stone-troubled bound. 

And the crickets that sing all the 
night. 

There are hours 

Which belong to unknown, super- 
natural powers. 

Whose sudden and solemn sugges- 
tions are all 

That to this race of worms — stinging 
creatures, that crawl. 

Lie, and fear, and die daily, beneath 
their own stings — 

Can excuse the blind boast of inher- 
ited wings. 



When the soul, on the impulse of 

anguish, hath passed 
Beyond anguish, and risen into rap- 
ture at last ; 
When she traverses nature and 

space, till she stands 
In the Chamber of Fate ; where, 

through tremulous hands. 
Hum the threads from an old-fash- 
ioned distaff luicurled, 
And those three blind old women sit 

siiinning the world. 
III. 
The dark was blanched wan, over- 
head. One green star 
Was slipping from sight in the pale 

void afar ; 
The spirits of change, and of awe, 

with faint breath 
Were shifting the midnight, above 

and beneath. 
The spirits of awe and of change 

were arovuid, 
And about, and upon her. 

A dull muffled sound. 
And a hand on her hand, like a 

ghostly surprise, 
And she felt herself fixed by the hot 

hollow eyes 
Of the Frenchman before her : those 

eyes seemed to burn. 
And scorch out the darkness between 

them, and tm'n 
Into fire as they fixed her. He looked 

like the shade 
Of a creature by fancy from solitude 

made. 
And sent forth by the darkness to 

scare and oppress 
Some soul of a monk in a waste 

wilderness. 

IV. 

" At last, then, — at last, and alone, — 

I and thou, 
Lucile de Nevers, have we met ? 

" Hush ! I know 
Not for me was the tryst. Never 

mind ! it is mine ; 
And whatever led hither those proud 

steps of thine. 



LUCILE. 



127 



They remove not, until we have 

spoken. My hour 
Is come ; and it holds thee and me 

in its power, 
As the darkness holds both the hori- 
zons. 'Tis well ! 
The timidest maiden that e'er to the 

spell 
Of her first lover's vows listened, 

hushed with delight, 
When soft stars were brightly up- 
hanging the night, 
Never listened, I swear, more un- 

questioningly 
Than thy fate hath compelled thee 

to listen to me ! " 
To the sound of his voice, as though 

out of a dream. 
She appeared with a start to awaken. 
The stream. 
When he ceased, took the night with 

its moaning again. 
Like the voices of spirits departing 

in pain. 
" Continue," she answered, " Ilisten 

to hear." 
For a moment he did not I'eply. 

Through the drear 
And dim light between them, she 

saw that his face 
Was disturbed. To and fro he con- 
tinued to pace. 
With his arms folded close, and the 

low restless stride 
Of a panther, in circles around her, 

first wide. 
Then narrower, nearer, and quicker. 

At last 
He stood still, and one long look 

upon her he cast. 
" Lucile, dost thou dare to look into 

my face ? 
Is the sight so repugnant ? ha, well ! 

Canst thou trace 
One word of thy writing in this 

wicked scroll. 
With thine own name scrawled 

through it, defacing a soul ? " 
In his face there was something so 

wrathful and wild. 
That the sight of it scared her. 



He saw it, and smiled, 
And then turned him from her, re- 
newing again 
That short, restless stride; as though 

searching in vain 
For the point of some purpose within 

him. 

" Lucile, 
You shudder to look in my face : do 

you feel 
No reproach when you look in your 

own heart ? " 

"No, Duke, 
In my conscience I do not deserve 

your rebuke : 
Not yours ! " she replied. 

"No," he muttered again, 
" Gentle justice ! you first bid Life 

hope not, and then 
To Despair you say ' Act not ! ' " 

V. 

He watched her awhile 
With a chill sort of restless and suf- 
fering smile. 
They stood by the wall of the garden. 

The skies. 
Dark, sombre, were troubled with 

vague prophecies 
Of the dawn yet far distant. The 

moon had long set, 
And all in a glimmering light, pale, 

and wet 
With the night-dews, the white roses 

sullenly loomed 
Round about her. She spoke not. 

At length he resumed. 
"Wretched creatures we are ! I and 

thou, — one and all ! 
Only able to injure each other, and 

fall 
Soon or late, in that void which our- 
selves we prepare 
For the souls that we boast of ! weak 

insects we are ! 
O heaven ! and what has become of 

them ? all 
Those instincts of Eden surviving 

the Fall : 
That glorious faith in inherited 

thines : 



That sense in the soul of the length 

of her wings ; 
Gone I all gone ! and the wail of the 

night-wind sounds human, 
Bewailing those once nightly visit- 
ants ! Woman, 
Woman, what hast thou done with 

my youth ? Give again, 
Give me back the young heart that 

I gave thee ... in vain ! " 
"Duke !" she faltered. 
" Yes, yes ! " lie went on, '•' I was 

not 
Ahvays thus ! what I once was, I 

have not forgot." 



As the wind that heaps sand in a 
desert, there stirred 

Through his voice an emotion that 
swept every woi-d 

Into one angry wail ; as, with fever- 
ish change, 

He continued his monologue, fitful 
and strange. 

" Woe to him, in whose nature, once 
kindled, the torch 

Of Passion bm-ns downward to black- 
en and scorch ! 

•But shame, shame and sorrow, O 
woman, to thee 

W^hose hand sowed the seed of de- 
struction in me ! 

Whose lip taught the lesson of false- 
hood to mine ! 

Whose looks made me doubt lies that 
looked so divine ! 

My soul by thy beauty was slain in 
its sleep : 

And if tears I mistrust, 'tis that thou 
too canst weep ! 

Well ! . . . how utter soever it be, 
one mistake 

In the love of a man, what more 
change need it make 

In the steps of his soul through the 
course love began, 

Than all other mistakes in th.e life 
of a man ? 

And I said to myself, ' I am young 
yet : too young 



To have wholly survived my own 

portion among 

The great needs of iTian's life, or ex- 
hausted its joys ; 

What is broken ? one only of youth's 
pleasant toys ; 

Shall I be the less welcome, whei'e- 
ever I go. 

For one passion survived ? No ! the 
roses will blow 

As of yore, as of yore will the night- 
ingales sing, 

Not less sweetly for one blossom can- 
celled from Spring I 

Hast thou loved, O my heart ? to 
thy love yet remains 

All the wide loving-kindness of 
nature. The plains 

And the hills with each summer 
their verdure renew. 

Wonldst thou be as they are ? do 
thou then as they do. 

Let the dead sleep in peace. Would 
the living divine 

Where they slumber ? Let only new 
flowers be the sign ! 

" Vain ! all vain ! . . . For when, 

laughing, the wine I would 

quaff, 
I remembered too well all it cost me 

to laugh. 
Through the revel it was but the old 

song I heard, 
Through the crowd the old footsteps 

behind me they stirred, 
In the night-wind, the starlight, the 

murmurs of even. 
In the ardors of earth, and the lan- 
guors of heaven, 
I could trace nothing more, nothing 

more through the spheres. 
But the sound of old sobs, and the 

tracks of old tears ! 
It was with me the night long in 

dreaming or waking, 
It abided in loathing, when daylight 

was breaking, 
The burden of the bitterness in me ! 

Behold, 
All my days were become as a tale 

that is told. 



And I said to my sight, 'No good 
thing shalt thou see, 

For the noonday is turned to dark- 
ness in me. 

In the liouse of Oblivion my bed I 
have made.' 

And I said to tlie grave, 'Lo, my 
father ! ' and said 

To the worm, ' Lo, my sister ! ' The 
dust to tlie dust, 

And one end to the wicked sliall be 
with the just ! " 



He ceased, as a wind that wails out 

on the night, 
And moans itself mute. Through 

the indistinct liglit 
A voice clear, and tender, and pure 

with a tone 
Of ineffable pity replied to his own. 
" And say you, and deem you, that 

I wrecked your life ? 
Alas ! Due de Luvois, had I been 

your wife 
By a fraud of the heart which could 

yield you alone 
For the love in your nature a lie in 

my own. 
Should I not, in deceiving, have in- 
jured you worse ? 
Yes, I then should have merited 

justly your curse, 
For I then should have wronged 

you !" 

"Wronged ! ah, is it so ? 

Tou could never have loved me ? " 

"Duke !" 

"Never? O no ! " 

(He broke into a fierce, angry laugh, 

as he said) 
"Yet, lady, you knew that I loved 

you : you i-ed 
My love on to lay to its heart, hour 

by houi-, 
All the pale, cruel, beautiful, passion- 
less power 
Shut up in that cold face of yours ! 

was this well '? 
But enough, not on you would I vent 

the wild hell 

9 



Which has grown in my heart, 
that man, first and last 

He tramples in triun:ph my life I he 
has cast 

His shadow 'twixt me and the sun 
... let it pass ! 

My hate yet may find him ! " 

Sbe murmured, "Alas ! 

These Avords, at least, spare me the 
pain of reply. 

Enough, Due de Luvois ! farewell. 
I sliall try [every sight 

To forget every Mord I have heard. 

That has grieved and appalled me in 
this wretched night 

Which must witness our final fare- 
well. May you, Duke, 

Never know greater cause your own 
heart to rebuke 

Than mine thus to wrong and afflict 
you have had ! 

Adieu ! " 

"Stay, Lucile, stay!"' ... he 
groaned, . . . " I am mad. 

Brutalized, blind with pain ! I know 
not what I said. 

I meant it not. But" (he moaned, 
drooping his head) 

" Forgive me ! I — have I so wrong- 
ed you, Lucile ? 

I . . . have I . '. . forgive me, for- 
give me ! " 

" I feel 

Only sad, very sad to the soul," she 
said, " far. 

Far too sad for resentment." 

" Yet stand as you are 

One moment," he murmured. "I 
think, could I gaze 

Thus awhile on your face, the old in- 
nocent days 

Would come back upon me, and this 
scorching heart 

Free itself in hot tears. Do not, do 
not depart 

Thus, Lucile I stay one moment. I 
know why you shrink. 

Why you shudder ; I read in your 
face what you think. 

Do not speak to me of it. And yet, 
if you will, 



I30 



LUCILE. 



Whatever you say, my own lips shall 

be still. 
I lied. And the truth, now, could 

justify naught. 
There are battles, it may be, in 

which to have fought 
Is more shameful than, simply, -to 

fail. Yet, Lucile, 
Had you helped me to bear what you 

' forced me to feel — " 
"Could I help you," she murmured, 

" but what can I say 
That your life will respond to ? " 

" My life ? " he sighed. " Nay, 
My life liaih brought forth only evil, 

and there 
The wild wind hath planted the wild 

weed : yet ere 
You exclaim, ' Fling the weed to the 

flames,' think again 
Why the field is so barren. With all 

other men [only goes 

First love, though it perish from life. 
Like the primrose that falls to make 

way for the rose. 
For a man, at least most men, may 

love on through life : 
Love in fame ; love in knowledge ; 

in work : earth is rife 
With labor, and therefore with love, 

for a man. 
If one love fails, another succeeds, 

and the plan 
Of man"s life includes love in all 

()l)jects ! But I ? 
All such loves from my life through 

its whole destiny 
Fate excluded. The love that I gave 

you, alas ! 
Was tiie sole love that life gave to 

me. Let that pass ! 
It perished, and all perished with it. 

Ambition ? 
Wealth left nothing to add to my 

social condition. 
Fame ? But fame in itself presup- 
poses some great 
Field wherein to pursue and attain 

it. The State ? 
1, to cringe to an upstart ? The 

Camp ? I, to draw 



From its sheath the old sword of the 

Dukes of Luvois 
To defend usurpation ? Books, 

then '? Science, Art ? 
But, alas ! I was fashioned for action : 

my heart. 
Withered thing though it be, 1 should 

hardly compress 
'Twixt the leaves of a treatise on 

Statics : life's stress 
Needs scope, not contraction ! what 

rests ? to wear out 
At some dark northern court an ex- 
istence, no doubt. 
In wretclied and paltry intrigues for 

a cause 
As hopeless as is my own life ! By 

the laws [dispute. 

Of a fate I can neither control nor 
I am what I am ! " 

VIII. 

For a while she was mute. 
Then she answered, "We are our 

own fates. Our own deeds 
Are our doomsmen. Man's life was 

made not for men's creeds, 
But men's actions. And, Due de 

Luvois, I might say 
That all life attests, that 'the will 

m.ikos the way.' 
Is the land of our birth less the land 

of our birth, 
Or its claim the less strong, or its 

cause the less worth 
Our upholding, because the white 

lily no more 
Is as sacred as all that it bloomed 

for of yore ? 
Yet be that as it may be ; I cannot 

perchance 
Judge this matter I am but a wo- 
man, and France 
Has for me simpler duties. Large 

hope, though, Eugene 
De Luvois, should be yours. There 

is puri)ose in i^ain, 
Otherwise it were devilish. I trust 

in my soul 
That the great master hand which 

sweeps over the whole 



LUCILE. 



^31 



Of this deep harp of life, if at mo- 
ments it stretcli 
To shrill tension some one wailing 

nerve, means to fetch 
Its response the truest, most strin- 
gent, and smart, 
Its pathos the purest, from out the 

wrung heai't, 
Whose faculties, flaccid it may be, if 

less 
Sharply strung, sharply smitten, had 

failed to express 
Just the one note the great final har- 
mony needs. 
And what best proves there's life in 

a heart ? — that it bleeds ! 
Grant a cause to remove, grant an 

end to attain. 
Grant both to be just, and what 

mercy in pain ! 
Cease the sin with the soitow ! See 

morning begin ! 
Pain must burn itself out if not 

fuelled by sin. 
There is hope in yon hill-tops, and 

love in yon light. 
Let hate and despondency die witli 

the night !" 

He was moved by her words. As 
some poor wretch confined 

In cells loud with meaningless laugh- 
ter, whose mind 

Wanders trackless amidst its own 
ruins, may hear 

A voice heard long since, silenced 
many a year, 

And now, 'mid mad ravings recap- 
tured again. 

Singing through the caged lattice a 
once well-known strain, 

Wliich brings back his boyhood upon 
it, until 

The mind's ruined crevices gracious- 
ly fill 

With music and memory, and, as it 
were. 

The long-troubled spirit grows slowly 
aware 

Of the mockery round it, and shrinks 
from each thing 



It once sought, — the poor idiot who 

passed for a king, 
Hard by, with his squalid straw 

crown, now confessed 
A madman more painfully mad than 

the rest, — 
So the sound of her voice, as it there 

wandered o'er 
His echoing heart, seemed in part to 

I'estore 
The forces of thought : he recaptured 

the whole 
Of his life by the light which, in 

passing, Iier soul 
Reflected on his : he appeared to 

awake 
From a dream, and perceived he had 

dreamed a mistake : 
His spirit was softened, j'et troubled 

in him : 
He felt his lips falter, his eyesight 

grow dim. 
But he murmured . . . 
" Lucile, not for me that sun's light 
Which reveals — not restores — the 

Avild havoc of night. 
There are some creatures born for 

the night, not the day. 
Broken-hearted the nightingale hides 

in the spray, 
And the owl's moody mind in his 

own hollow tower 
Dwells muffled. Be darkness hence- 
forward my dower. 
Light, be sure, in that darkness there 

dwells, by which eyes 
Grown familiar with ruins may yet 

recognize 
Enousjrli desolation." 



" The pride that claims here 
On earth to itself (liowsoevei- severe 
To itself it may bej God's dread office 

and right 
Of punishing sin, is a sin in heaven's 

sight, 
And against heaven's service. 

" Eugene ,de Luvois. 
Leave the judgment to Him Avho 

alone knows the law. 



X32 



LUCILE. 



Surely no man can be his own judge, 
least of all 

His own doomsman." 

Her words seemed to fall 

With the weight of tears in them. 

He looked up, and saw 

That sad serene countenance, mourn- 
ful as law 

And tender as pity, bowed o'er him : 
and heard 

In some thicket the matinal chirp of 
a bird. 

X. 

" Vulgar natures alone suffer vainly. 

"Eugene," 

She continued, " in life we have met 

once again, 
And once more life parts us. Yon 

day-spring for me 
Lifts the veil of a future in which it 

may be 
We shall meet nevermore. Grant, 

O grant to me yet 
The belief that it is not in vain we 

have met ! 
I plead for the future. A new horo- 
scope 
I would cast : will you read it ? I 

plead for a hope : 
I plead for a memory ; yours, yours 

alone, 
To restore or to spare. Let the hope 

be your own, 
Be the memoi-y mine. 

" Once of yore, when for man 
Faith yet lived, ere this age of the 

sluggard began. 
Men, aroused to the knowledge of 

evil, fled far 
From the fading rose-gardens of 

sense, to tlie war 
With the Pagan, the cave in the 

desert, and sought 
Not repose, but employment in action 

or thought, 
Life's strong earnest, in all things ! 

O think not of me, 
But yourself ! for I plead for your 

own destiny : 
I plead, for your life, with its duties 
undone, 



With its claims xmappeased, and its 
trophies unwon ; 

And in pleading for life's fair fulfil- 
ment, I plead 

For all that you miss, and for all that 
you need." 

XI, 

Through the calm crystal air, faint 

and far, as she spoke, 
A clear, chilly chime from a cluu'ch- 

tun'ct broke ; 
And the sound of her voice, with the 

sound of tlie bell. 
On his ear. where he kneeled, .softly, 

soothingly fell. 
All within him was wild and con- 
fused, as within 
A chamber deserted in some roadside 

inn, 
Where, passing, wild travellers 

paused, over-night, 
To quaff and carouse ; in each socket 

each light 
Is extinct ; crashed the glasses, and 

scrawled is the wall 
With wild ribald ballads : serenely 

o'er all. 
For the first time perceived, where 

ttie dawn-light creeps faint 
Through the wrecks of that orgy, the 

face of a saint. 
Seen through some broken frame, 

appears noting meanwhile 
The ruin all round with a sorrowful 

smile. 
And he gazed round. The cui^tains 

of Darkness half drawn 
Oped behind her ; and pure as the 

pure light of dawn. 
She stood, batlied in morning, and 

seemed to his eyes 
From their sight to be melting awaj' 

in the skies 
That expanded around her. 

XII. 

There passed thi-ough his head 
A fancy, — a vision. That woman 

was dead 
He had loved long ago, — loved and 
: lost ! dead to him, 



LUCILE. 



133 



Dead to all the life left him ; but 
there, in the dim 

Dewy light of the dawn, stood a 
spirit ; 'twas hers ; 

And he said to the soul of Lucile de 
Nevers : [away ! 

"O soul to its sources departing 

Pray for mine, if one soul for anoth- 
er may pray. 

I to ask have no right, thou to give 
hast no power, 

One hope to my heart. But in this 
parting hour 

I name not my heart, and I speak 
not to tliine. 

Answer, soul of Lucile, to this dark 
soul of mine. 

Does not soul owe to soul, what to 
heart heart denies, 

Hope, when hope is salvation ? Be- 
hold, in yon skies, 

This wild night is passing away while 
I speak : 

Lo, above us, the day-spring begin- 
ning to break ! 

Something wakens within me, and 
warms to the beam. 

Is it hope that awakens ? or do I but 
dream ? 

I know not. It may be, perchance, 
the first spark 

Of a new light within me to solace 
the dark 

Unto whicli I return ; or perchance 
it may be 

The last spark of fires half extin- 
guished in me. 

I know not. Thou goest thy way : I 
my own : 

For good or for evil, I know not. 
Alone 

This I know ; we are parting. I 
wished to say more. 

But no matter ! 'twill pass. All be- 
tween us is o'er. 

Forget the wild words of to-night. 
'Twas the pain 

For long-years hoarded up, that rush- 
ed from me again. 

I was imjust : forgive me. Spare 
now to reprove 



Other words, other deeds. It was 

madness, not love, 
That you thwarted this night. What 

is done is now done. 
Death remains to avenge it, or life to 

atone. 
I was maddened, delirious ! I saw 

you retiu'n 
To him — not to me ; and I felt my 

heart burn 
With a fierce thirst for vengeance — 

and thus ... let it pass ! 
Long thoughts these, and so brief 

the moments, alas ! | 

Thou goest thy way, and I mine. I i 

suppose I 

'Tis to meet nevermore. Is it not 

so ? Who knows. 
Or who heeds, where the exile from 

Paradise flies ? 
Or what altars of his in the desert 

may rise ? 
Is it not so, Lucile ? Well, well ! 

Thus then we part 
Once again, soul from soul, as before 

heart from heart !" 



And again, clearer far than the chime 
of the bell. 

That voice on his sense softly, sooth- 
ingly fell. 

" Our two paths must part us, Eu- 
gene ; for my own 

Seems no more through that world 
in which henceforth alone 

You must work out (as now I believe 
that you will ) 

The hope wliich you speak of. That 
work I shall still 

(If I live) watch and welcome, and 
bless far away. 

Doubt not this. But mistake not the 
thought, if I say, 

That the great moral combat between 
human life 

And each human soul must be single. 
The strife 

None can share, though by all its re- 
sults may be known. 



When the soul arms for battle, ehe 
goes forth alone. 

I say not, indeed, we shall meet nev- 
ermore, 

For I know not. But meet, as we 
have met of yore, 

I know that we cannot. Perchance 
we may meet 

By the death-bed, the tomb, in the 
crowd, in the street. 

Or in solitude even, but never again 

iShall we meet from henceforth as 
we have met, Eugene. 

For we know not the way we are go- 
ing, nor yet 

Where our two ways may meet, or 
may cross. Life hatli set 

No landmarks before us. But this, 
this alone, 

I will promise : whatever your path, 
or my own. 

If, for once in the conflict before you, 
it chance 

That the Dragon prevail, and with 
cleft shield, and lance 

Lost or shattei-ed, borne down by the 
stress of the M'ar, 

You falter and hesitate, if from afar 

I, still watching (uulcnown to your- 
self, it may be) 

O'er the conflict to which I conjure 
you, should see 

That my presence could rescue, sup- 
port you, or guide, 

In the hour of tliat need I shall be 
at your side. 

To warn, if you will, or incite, or 
control ; 

And again, once again, we shall 
meet, soul to soul ! " 



The voice ceased. 

He uplifted his eyes. 

All alone 
He stood on the bare edge of dawn. 

She Mas gone. 
Like a star, when up bay after bay 

of the night, 
Bipples in, wave on wave, the broad 
ocean of light. 



And at once, in her place, was the 

Sunrise ! It rose 
In its sumptuous splendor and 

solemn repose, 
The supreme revelation of light. 

Domes of gold. 
Realms of rose, in the Orient ! And 

breathless, and bold, 
While the grear gates of lieaven roll- 
ed back one by one, 
The bright lierald angel stood stern 

in the sun ! 
Thrice holy Eo3[)heros ! Light's 

reign began 
In the heaven, on the earth, in the 

heart of the man. 
The dawn on the mountains ! the 

dawn everywhere ! 
Light! silence I the, fresh innovations 

of air ! 
O earth, and O ether ! A butterfly 

breeze 
Floated up, fluttered down, and 

poised blithe on the trees. 
Through the I'ovelling woods, o'er 

the shai'p-rippled stream, 
Up the vale slow uncoiling itself out 

of dream, 
Around the brown meadows, adown 

the hill-slope, 
The spirits of morning were whisper- 
ing, "ifoiJe.'" 



He uplifted his eyes. In the place 

where she stood 
But a moment before, and where 

now rolled the flood 
Of the sunrise all golden, he seemed 

to behold. 
In the young light of sunrise, an 

image unfold 
Of his own youth, — its ardors, — its 

promise of fame, — 
Its ancestral ambition ; and France 

by the name 
Of his sires seemed to call him 

There, hovered in light, 
That image aloft, o'er the shapeless 

and bright 



LUCILE. 



135 



And Aurorean clouds, which them- 
selves seemed to be 
Brilliant fragments of that golden 

world, wherein he 
Had once dwelt, a native ! 

There, rooted and bound 
To the earth, stood the man, gazing 

at it ! Around 
The rims of the sunrise it hovered 

and shone 
Transcendent, that type of a youth 

that was gone ; 
And he, — as the body may yearn for 

the soul. 
So he yearned to embody that image. 

His whole 
Heart arose to regain it. 

"And is it too late?" 
No ! For time is a fiction, and limits 

not fate. 
Thought alone is eternal. Time 

thralls it in vain. 
For the thought that springs upward 

and yearns to regain 
The pure som-ce of spirit, there is no 

Too LATE. 

As the stream to its first mountain 

levels, elate 
In the fountain arises, the spirit in 

him 
Arose to that image. The image 

waned dim 
Into heaven ; and heavenwai"d with 

it, to melt 
As it melted, in day's broad expan- 
sion, he felt 
With a thrill, sweet and strange, and 

intense, — awed, amazed, — 
Something soar and ascend in his 

soul, as he gazed. 



CANTO VI. 



Mak is born on a battle-field. Eound 
him, to rend 

Or resist, the dread Powers he dis- 
places attend, 

i3y the cradle which Nature, amidst 
the stem shocks 



That have shattered creation, and 
shapen it, rocks. 

He leaps with a wail into being ; 
and lo ! 

His own mother, fierce Nature her- 
self, is his foe. 

Her whirlwinds are roused into 
wrath o'er his head : 

'Neath his feet roll her earthquakes : 
her solitudes spread 

To damit him : her forces dispute 
his command : 

Her snows fall to freeze him : her 
suns burn to-brand : 

Her seas yawn to engulf him : her 
rocks rise to crush : 

And the lion and leopard, allied, lurk 
to rush 

On their startled invader. 

In lone Malabar, 

Wliere the infinite forest spreads 
breathless and far, 

'Mid the cruel of eye and the stealthy 
of claw 

(Striped and spotted destroyers !) he 
sees, pale with awe, 

On the menacing edge of a fiery sky 

Grim Doorga, blue-limbed and red- 
handed, go by, [Terro'-. 

And the first thing he worships is 
Anon, 

Still impelled by necessity himgrily 
on, 

He conquers the realms of his own 
self-reliance. 

And the last cry of fear wakes the 
first of defiance. 

From the serpent he crushes its poi- 
sonous soul : 

Smitten down in his path see the 
dead lion roll ! 

On toward Heaven the son of Alc- 
mena strides high on 

The heads of the Hydra, the spoils 
of the lion : 

And man, conquering Terror, is wor- 
shipped by man. 

A camp has this world been since 
first it began ! 

From his tents sweeps the roving 
Arabian ; at peace, 



136 



LUCILE. 



A mere wandering sheplierd that fol- 
loM'S the fleece ; 

But, warring his way tlirough a 
world's destinies, 

Lo, from Delhi, from Bagdadt, from 
Cordova, rise 

Domes of empiry, dowered with 
science and art. 

Schools, libraries, forums, the pal- 
ace, the mart ! 

New realms to man's soul have been 

conquered. But those, 
^Forthwith they are peopled for man 

by new foes ! 
The stars keep their secrets, the 

earth hides her own. 
And bold must the man be that 

braves the Unliuown ! 
Not a truth has to art or to science 

been given, 
But brows have ached for it, and 

souls toiled and striven ; 
And many have striven, and many 

have failed. 
And many died, slain by tlie truth 

they assailed. 
But wlien Man hath tamed Nature, 

asserted his place 
And dominion, behold ! he is brought 

face to face 
With a new foe, — liimself ! 

Nor may man on his shield 
Ever rest, for his foe is forever afield. 
Danger ever at hand, till the armed 

Archangel 
Sound o'er him the trump of eartli's 

final evangel. 
II. 
Silence straightway, stern Muse, the 

soft cymbals of pleasure, 
Be all bronzen these niunbers, and 

martial the measure ! 
Breathe, sonorously breathe, o'er the 

spirit in me 
One strain, sad and stern, of tliat 

deep Epopee 
"Which thou, from the fashionless 

cloud of far time, 
Chantest lonely, wlien Victoiy, pale, 

and sublime 



In the light of the aureole over her 
head. 

Hears, and heeds not the woimd in 
her heart fresh and red. 

Blown wide by the blare of the clar- 
ion, unfold 

The shrill clanging curtains of war I 
And behold 

A Tision ! 

The antique Heraclean seats ; 

And the long Black Sea billow that 
once bore those fleets. 

Which said to the winds, " Be ye, 
too, Genoese ! " 

And the red angry sands of the 
chafed Chersonese ; 

And the two foes of man. War and 
Winter, allied 

Round the Armies of England and 
France, side by side 

Enduring and dying (Gaul and Brit- 
on abreast !) 

Where the towers of the North fret 
the skies of the East. 



Since that sunrise, which rose 
through the calm linden stems 

O'er Lucile and Eugene, in the gar- 
den at Ems, 

Through twenty-five seasons encir- 
cling the sun. 

This planet of ovu'S on its pathway 
hath gone. 

And the fates that I sing of havf 
flowed with the fates 

Of a world, in the red wake of war, 
round the gates 

Of that doomed and heroical city, in 
Avhlch 

(Fire crowning the rampart, blood 
bathing the ditch I) 

At bay, fights the Russian as some 
hunted bear,- 

Whom the huntsmen have hemmed 

round at last in his lair. 

IV. 

A fanged, arid plain, sapped with 
undergroxmd fire. 

Soaked with snow, torn with shot, 
mashed to ono gory mire 1 



LUCILE. 



137 



There Fate's iron scale hangs in hor- 
rid suspense, 

While those two famished ogres, — 
the Siege, the Defence, 

Face to face, through a vapor frore, 
dismal, and dim. 

Glare, scenting the breath of each 
other. 

The one 

Double-bodied, two-headed, — by sep- 
arate ways 

Winding, serpent-wise, nearer ; the 
other, each day's 

Sullen toil adding size to, — concen- 
trated, solid, 

Indefatigable, — the brass-fronted, 
embodied. 

And audible auros gone sombrely forth 

To the world from that Autocrat 
Will of the north ! 



In the dawn of a moody October, a 
pale 

Ghoslily motionless vapor began to 
pi-evail 

Over city and camp ; like the gar- 
ment of death 

Which (is formed by) the face it con- 
ceals. 

'Twas the breath 

War, yet drowsily yawning, began to 
suspire ; 

Wherethrough, here and there, flash- 
ed an eye of red fire. 

And closed, from some rampart be- 
ginning to bellow 

Hoarse challenge ; replied to anon, 
through the yellow 

And sulphurous twilight : till day 
reeled and rocked. 

And roared into dark. Then the 
midnight was mocked 

With fierce apparitions. Ringed 
round by a rain 

Of red fire, and of iron, the murther- 
ous plain 

Flared with fitful combustion ; v/here 
fitfully fell 

Afar off the fatal, disgorged schar- 
penelle, 



And fired the horizon, and singed 

the coiled gloom 
With wings of swift flame round that 

City of Doom. 



So the day — so the night ! So by 

night, so by day. 
With stern patient pathos, while 

time wears away. 
In the trench flooded through, in the 

wind where it wails. 
In the snow where it falls, in the fire 

where it hails 
Shot and shell — link by link, out of 

hardship and pain. 
Toil, sickness, endurance, is forged 

the bronze chain . 
Of those terrible siege-lines ! 

No change to that toil 
Save the mine's sudden leap from 

the treacherous soil, 
Save the midnight attaclc, save the 

groans of the maimed, 
And Death's daily obolus due, 

whether claimed 
By man or by nature. 

VII. I 

Time passes. The dumb, 
Bitter, snow-bound, and sullen No- 
vember is come. 
And its snows have been bathed iu 

the blood of the brave : 
And many a young heart has glutted 

the grave : 
And on Inkerman yet the wild 

bramble is gory. 
And those bleak heiglits hencefortli 

shall be famous in story. 

VIII. 

The moon, swathed in storm, has 

long set : through the camp 
No sound save the sentinel's slow 

sullen tramp, 
The distant explosion, the wild sleety 

wind, 
Tliat seems searching for something 

it never can find. 
The midnight is turning : the lamp 

is nigh spent : 



Aud, wounded and lone, m a deso- 
late tent 

Lies a young British soldier whose 
sword . . . 

In this place, 

However, my Muse is compelled to 
retrace 

Her precipitous steps and revert to 
the past. 

The shock wliich had suddenly shat- 
tered at last 

Alfred Vargrave's fantastical holiday 
nature. 

Had sharply drawn forth to his full 
size and stature 

The real man, concealed till that mo- 
ment beneath 

All he yet had appeared. From the 
gay broidered sheath 

Which a man in his wrath flings 
aside, even so 

Leaps the keen trenchant steel sum- 
moned forth by a blow. 

And thus loss of fortune gave value 
to life. 

The wife gained a husband, the hus- 
band a wife. 

In that home which, though humbled 
and nai-rowed by fate, 

Was enlarged and ennobled by love'. 
Low their state, 

But largo their possessions. 

Sir Ridley, forgiven 

By those he unwittingly brought 
nearer heaven 

By one fraudulent act, than through 
all his sleek speech 

The hypocrite brought his own soul, 
safe from reach 
• Of the law, died abroad. 

Cousin John, heart and hand. 

Purse and person, henceforth (hon- 
est man ! ) took his stand 

By Matilda and Alfred ; guest, guar- 
dian, and friend 

Of the home he both shared and as- 
sured, to the end, 

With his large lively love. Alfred 
Vargrave meanwhile 

Faced the world's frown, consoled 
by his wife's faithful smile. 



Late in life he began life in earnest ; 
and still, 

With the tranquil exertion of reso- 
lute will, 

Through long, and laborious, and 
difficult days, 

Out of manifold failure, by weari- 
some ways, 

Worked his way through the world ; 
till at last he began 

(Reconciled to the work which man- 
kind claims from man). 

After years of unwitnessed, unwea- 
ried endeavor. 

Years itnpassioned yet patient, to 
realize ever 

More clear on the broad stream of 
current opinion 

The reflex of powers in himself, — 
that dominion 

Which the life of one man, if his 
life be a truth, 

May assert o'er the life of mankind. 
Thus, his youth 

In his manhood renewed, fame and 
fortune he won 

Working only for home, love, and 
duty. 

One son 

Matilda had borne him ; but scarce 
]iad the boy, 

With all Eton yet fresh in his full 
heart's frank joy, 

The darling of young soldier com- 
rades, just glanced 

Down the glad dawn of manhood at 
life, when it chanced 

That a blight sharp and sudden was 
breathed o'er the bloom 

Of his joyous and generous years, 
and the gloom 

Of a grief premature on their fair 
promise fell : 

No light cloud like those which, for 
June to dispel. 

Captious April engenders ; but deep 
as his own 

Deep natiu-e. 3Ieanwhile, ere I fully 
make known 

The cause of tliis sorrow, I track the 
event. 



LUCILE. 



139 



I 



When first a wild war-note through 
England was sent, 

He, transferring without either to- 
ken or word. 

To friend, parent, or comrade, a yet 
virgin sword, 

From a holiday troop, to one bound 
for the war. 

Had marched forth, with eyes that 
saw death in the star 

tVlience others sought glory. Thus, 
fighting, he fell 

On the red field of Inkerman ; foxuid, 
who can tell 

By what miracle, breathing, though 
shattered, and borne 

To the rear by his comrades, pierc- 
ed, bleeding, and torn. 

Where for long days and nights, 
with the womid in his side, 

He lay, dark. 

IX. 

But a wound deeper far, unde- 

scribed, 
In the yomig heart was rankling ; 

for there, of a truth. 
In the first earnest faith of a pure 

pensive youth, 
A love large as life, deep and 

changeless as death. 
Lay enslieatlied : and that love, ever 

fretting its sheath. 
The frail scabbard of life pierced and 

wore through and through. 
There are loves in man's life for 

which time can renew 
All that time may destroy. Lives 

there are, though, in love, 
Which cling to one faith, and die 

with it ; nor move. 
Though earthquakes may shatter the 

shrine. 

Whence or how 
Love laid claim to this young life, it 

matters not now. 

X. 

O, is it a phantom ? a dream of the 

night ? 
A vision Avhich fever hatli fashioned 

to sight ? 



The wind wailing ever, with motion 

uncertain. 
Sways sighingly there the drenched 

tent's tattered curtain. 
To and fro, uj) and down. 

But it is not the wind 
That is lifting it now : and it is not 

the mind 
That hath moulded that vision. 

A pale woman enters, 
As wan as the lamp's waning light, 

Avhich concentres 
Its dull glare upon her. With eyes 

dim and dimmer 
There, all in a slumberous and shad- 
owy glimmer. 
The sufferer sees that still form float- 
ing on, 
And feels faintly aware that he is 

not alone. 
She is flitting before him. She 

pauses. She stands 
By his bedside, all silent. She lays 

her white hands 
On the broAv of the boy. A light 

finger is pressing 
Softly, softly the sore wounds : the 

hot bioort-stained dressing 
Slips from them. A comforting 

quietude steals 
Through the racked weary frame : 

and, throughout it, he feels 
The slow sense of a merciful, mild 

neighborhood. 
Something smooths the tossed pillow. 

Beneath a gray hood 
Of rough serge, two intense tender 

eyes are bent o'er him, 
And thrill through and through him. 

The sweet form before him, 
It is surely Death's angel Life's last 

vigil keeping ! 
A soft voice says . . . "Sleep !" 

And he sleeps : he is sleeping. 

XI. 

He waked before dawn. Still the 

vision is there : 
Still that pale woman moves not. A 

ministering care 



I40 



LUCILE. 



Meanwhile has been silently chang- 
ing and cheering 

The aspect of all things aronnd him. 
Revering 

Some power unknown and benig- 
nant, he blessed 

In silence the sense of salvation. 
And i-est 

Having loosened the mind's tangled 
meshes, he faintly 

Sighed . . . "Say what thoii art, 
blessed dream of a saintly 

And ministering spirit ! " 

A whisper serene 

Slid, softer than silence . . . "The 
Soeur Seraphine, 

A poor Sister of Charity. Shun to 
inquire 

Aught further, young soldier. The 
son of thy sire, 

For the sake of that sire, I reclaim 
from the grave. 

Thou didst not shun death : shun 
not life. 'Tis more brave 

To live, than to die. Sleep ! " 

He sleeps : he is sleeping. 



He wakened again, when the dawn 

was just steeping 
The skies Avith chill splendor. And 

there, never flitting. 
Never flitting, that vision of mercy 

was sitting. 
As the dawn to the darkness, so life 

seemed returning 
Slowly, feebly within him. The 

night-lamp, yet burning, 
Made ghastly the glimmering day- 
break. 

He said, 
" K thou be of the living, and not of 

the dead. 
Sweet minister, pour out yet further 

the healing [revealing 

Of that balmy voice ; if it may be. 
Thy mission of mercy 1 whence art 

thou?" 

" O son 
Of Matilda and Alfred, it matters 

not I One 



Who is not of the living nor yet of 

the dead : 
To thee, and to others, alive yet" 

. . . slie said ... 
"So long as there liveth the poor 

gift in me 'to thee, 

Of this ministration ; to them, and 
Dead in all things beside. A French 

Xun, whose vocation 
Is now by this bedside. A nun hath 

no nation. 
Wherever man suffers or woman 

may soothe, 
There her land ! there her kindred ! " 
She bent down to smooth 
The hot pillow : and added . . . 

" Yet more than another 
Is thy life dear to me. For thy 

father, thy mother, 
I knew them, — I know them." 

" O can it be ? you ! 
My dearest dear father ! my mother! 

you knew. 
You know them ?" 

She bowed, half averting, her head 
In silence. 

He brokenly, timidly said, 
" Do they know I am thus ? " 
"Hush!" . . . she smiled, as she 

drew 
From her bosom two letters ; and — 

car) it be true ? 
That beloved and familiar writing ! 
He burst 
Into tears . . . " My poor mother — 

my father ! the worst 
Will have reached them ! " 

"No, no !" she exclaimed with a 

smile, 
"They know you are living; they 

know that meanwhile 
I am watching beside you. Young 

soldier, weep not I" 
But still on the nun's nursing bosom, 

the hot 
Fevered brow of the boy weeping 

wildly is pressed. 
There, at last, the young heart sobs 

itself into rest : 
And he hears, as it were between 

smiling and weeping. 



LUCILE. 



141 



The calm voice say . . . "Sleep !" 
And he sleeps, he is sleeping. 



And day followed day. And, as 
wave follows wave, 

With the tide, day by day, life, reis- 
suing, drave 

Through that young hardy frame 
novel currents of health. 

Yet some strange obstruction, which 
life's self by stealth 

Seemed to cherisli, impeded life's 
progress. And still 

A feebleness, less of the frame than 
the will. 

Clung about the sick man : hid and 
harbored within 

The sad hollow eyes : pinched the 
cheek pale and thin : 

And clothed the wan fingers with 
languor. 

And there, 

Day by day, night by night, unre- 
mitting in care, 

Unwearied in watching, so cheerful 
of mien. 

And so gentle of hand, sat the Soeur 
Seraphine ! 



A strange woman truly ! not young ; 

yet her face, 
Wan and worn, as it was, bore about 

it the trace 
Of a beauty which time could not 

ruin. For the whole 
Quiet cheek, youth's lost bloom left 

transparent, the soul 
Seemed to fill with its own light, like 

some sunny fountain 
Everlastingly fed from far oif in the 

mountain 
That pours, in a garden deserted, its 

streams, 
And all the more lovely for loneli- 
ness seems. 
So that, watching that face, you 

would scarce pause to guess 
The years which its calm careworn 

lines might express, 



Feeling only what suffering with 
these must have passed 

To have perfected there so much 
sweetness at last. 



Thus, one bronzen evening, when 

day had put out 
His brief thrifty fires, and the wind 1 
was about, j 

The nun, watchful still by the boy, 

on his own 
Laid a firm quiet hand, and the deep 

tender tone 
Of her voice moved the silence. 

She said ..." I have healed 
These wounds of the body. Why 

hast thou concealed, 
Young soldier, that yet open wound 

"in the heart ? 
Wilt thou trust no hand near it ?" 

He winced, with a start, 
As of one that is suddenly touched 

on the spot 
From which every nerve derives 
suffering. 

"What? 
Lies my heart, then, so bare ?" he 
moaned bitterly. 

"Nay," 
With compassionate accents she 

hastened to say, 
" Do you think that these eyes are 

with sorrow, young man. 
So all mifamiliar, indeed, as to scan 
Her features, yet know them not ? 

" O, was it spoken, 
' Go ye forth, heal the sick, lift the 

low, bind the broken ! ' 
Of the body alone ? Is our mission, 

then, done, 
When we leave the bruised hearts, if 

we bind the bruised bone ! 
Nay, is not the mission of mercy 

twofold ? 
Whence twofold, perchance, are the 

powers, that we hold 
To fulfil it, of Heaven ! For Heaven 

doth still 
To us, Sisters, it may be, who seek 
it, send skill 



4 



142 



LUCILE. 



Won from long intercourse with af- 
fliction, and art 
Helped of Heaven, to bind up the 

broken of heart. 
Trust to me!" (His two feeble 

hands in her own 
She drcAv gently. ) " Trust to me I" 

(she said, with soft tone) : 
" I am not so dead in remembrance 

to all 
I have died to in this world, but 

Avhat I recall [trial, 

Enough of its sorrow, enough of its 
To grieve for both, — save from both 

liaply ! The dial 
Receives many shades, and each 

points to the sun. 
The shadows are many, the sunlight 

is one. 
Life's sorrows still fluctuate : God's 

love does not. 
And His love is unchanged, when it 

changes our lot. 
Looking up to this light, which is 

common to all. 
And down to these shadows, on 

each side, that fall 
In time's silent circle, so various for 

each. 
Is it nothing to know that they never 

can reach 
So far. but what light lies beyond 

them forever ? 
Trust to me ! O, if in this hour I 

endeavor 
To trace the shade creeping across 

the yoiuig life 
Wliieh, in prayer till this hour, I 

have watched through its strife 
With the shadow of death, 'tis with 

this faith alone, 
Tliat, in tracing the shade, I shall 

find out the sun. 
Trust to me I" 
She paused : he was weeping. 

Small need 
C'f added appeal, or entreaty, indeed, 
Had those gentle accents to win from 

I'is pale 
And p.r.rhed, trembling lips, as it 

ruse, the brief tale 



Of a life's early sorrow. The story 

is old, 
And in words few as may be shall 

straightway be told. 



A few years ago, ere the fair form of 

Peace 
Was driven from Europe, a young 

girl — the niece 
Of a French noble, leaving an old 

Norman pile 
By the wild northern seas, came to 

d^'ell for a Avhile 
With a lady allied to her race, — an 

old dame 
Of a threefold legitimate virtue, and. 

name, 
In the Faubom-g Saint Germain. 

Upon that fair child. 
From childhood, nor father nor 

mother had smile<l. 
One imcle their place in her life had 

supplied. 
And their place in her heart : she 

had gi"own at his side. 
And under his roof-tree, and in his 

regard, 
From childhood to girlhood. 

This fair orphan M-ard 
Seemed the sole human creature 

that lived in the heart 
Of that stern rigid man, or whose 

smile could impart 
One ray of response to the eyes 

wiiich, above 
Her fair infant forehead, loolvcd 

down with a love 
That seemed almost stern, so in- 
tense was its chill 
Lofty stillness, like sunlight on some 

lonely hill 
Which is colder and stiller than sun- " 

light elsewhei'e. 

Grass grew in the court-yard ; the 

chambers were bare 
In tliat ancient mansion ; when first 

the stern tread 
Of its owner awakened their echoes 

long dead : 



LUCILE. 



143 



Bringing with liim this infant (the 

child of a brother), 
Whom, dying, the hands of a deso- 
late mother 
Had placed on his bosom. 'Twas 

said — right or wrong — 
Tliat, in tlie lone mansion, left ten- 

antless long, 
To which, as a stranger, its lord now 

returned,. 
In years yet recalled, through loud 

midnights had burned 
The light of wild orgies. Be that 

false or true. 
Slow and sad was the footstep which 

now wandered through 
Those desolate chambers ; and calm 

and severe 
Was the life of their inmate. 

Men now saw appear 
Every morn at the )nass that firm 

sorrowful face, 
Which seemed to lock up in a cold 

iron case 
Tears hardened to crystal. Yet harsh 

if he were, 
His severity seemed to be trebly se- 
vere 
In the rule of his own rigid life, 

which, at least, 
Was benignant to others. The poor 

parish priest, 
Who lived on his largess, his piety 

praised. 
The peasant was fed, and the chapel 

was raised. 
And the cottage was built, by his 

liberal hand. 
Yet he seemed in the midst of his 

good deeds to stand 
A lone, and unloved, and unlovable 

man. 
There appeared some inscrutable 

flaw in the plan 
Of Ills life, that love failed to pass 

over. 

That child 
Alone did not fear him, nor shrink 

from liim ; smiled 
To his frown, and dispelled it. 

'iMie sweet sportive elf 



Seemed the type of some joy lost, 
and missed, in himself. 

Ever welcome lie suffered her glad 
face to glide 

In on hours when to others his door 
was denied : 

And many a time with a mute moody 
look 

He would watch her at prattle and 
play, like a brook 

Whose babble disturbs not the quiet- 
est spot, 

But soothes us because we need an- 
swer it not. 

But few years had passed o'er, that 
childhood before 

A change canie among them. A let- 
ter, which bore 

Sudden consequence with it, one 
morning was placed 

In the hands of the lord of the cha- 
teau. He paced 

To and fro in liis chamber a whole 
night alone 

After reading that letter. At dawn 
he was gone. 

Weeks passed. "Wlien he came back 

again he returned ( 

With a tall ancient, dame, from 
whose lips the child learned 

That they were of the same race and 
name. With a face 

Sad and anxious, to this withered 
stock of the race 

He confided the orphan and left 
them alone 

In the lonely old house. 

In a few days 'twas known, 

To the angry surprise of half Paris, 
that one 

Of the chiefs of that party which. 
still clinging on 

To the banner that bears the white 

lilies of France, i 

Will fight 'neath no other, nor yet ; 
for the chance 

Of restoring their own, had re- 
iiounce'd the watchword 

And the creed of his youth in un- 
sheathing his sword 



144 



LUCILE. 



For a Fatherland fathered no more 

(such is fate !) 
By legitimate parents. 

And meanwhile, elate 
And in no wise disturbed by what 

Paris might say, 
The new soldier thus wrote to a friend 

far away : — 
" To the life of inaction farewell ! 

After all, 
Creeds the oldest may crumble, and 

dynasties fall. 
But the sole grand Legitimacy will 

endure, 
In whatever makes death noble, life 

strong and pure. 
Freedom ! action ! . . . the desert to 

breathe in, — the lance 
Of the Arab to follow ! I go ! Vixie 

la France!''^ 

Few and rare were the meetings 
henceforth, as years fled, 

'Twixt the child and the soldier. 
The two M'omen led 

Lone lives in the lone house. Mean- 
while Ihe child grew 

Into girlhood ; and, like a sunbeam, 
sliding through 

Her green quiet years, changed by 
gentle degrees 

To the loveliest vision of youth a 
youth sees 

In his loveliest fancies : as pure as a 
pearl, 

Ind as perfect : a noble and inno- 
cent girl. 

With eighteen sweet summers dis- 
solved in the light 

Of her lovely and lovable eyes, soft 
and bright ! 

Then her guardian wrote to the 
dame, . . . "Let Constance 

Go with you to Paris. I trust that 
in France 

I may be ere the close of the year. 
I confide 

My life's treasure to you. Let her 
see. at your side, 

The world which we live in." 

To Paris then came 



Constknce to abide with that old 

stately dame 
In that old stately Faubourg. 

The young Englishman 
Thus met her. 'Twas there their 

acquaintance began, 
There it closed. That old miracle — 

Love-at-first-sight — 
Needs no explanations. The heart 

reads aright 
Its destiny sometimes. His love nei- 
ther chidden 
Nor checked, the yomig soldier was 

graciously bidden 
An habitual guest to that house by 

the dame. 
His own candid graces, the world- 
honored name 
Of his father (in him not dishonored ) 

were both [ing loath. 

Fair titles to favor. His love, noth- 
The old lady observed, was returned 

by Constance. 
And as the child's uncle his absence 

from France 
Yet prolonged, she (thus easing long 

self-gratulation) 
Wrote to him a lengthened and mov- 
ing narration 
Of the graces and gifts of the young 

English wooer : 
His father's fair fame ; the boy's 

deference to her ; 
His love for Constance, — unaffected, 

sincere ; 
And the girl's love for him, read by 

her in those clear 
Limpid eyes ; then the pleasure with 

Avhich she await e^l 
Her cousin's approval of all she had 

stated. 

At length from that cousin an an- 
swer there came. 

Brief, stern ; such as stunned and 
astonished the dame. 

" Let Constance leave Paris with you 

on the day 
You receive this. T'nlii my return 

she may stay 



LUCILE. 



u% 



At her convent awhile. If my niece 

wishes ever 
To behold me again, understand, she 

will never 
Wed that man. 
' ' You have broken faith with me. 

Farewell !" 

No appeal from that sentence. 

It needs not to tell 
Tlie tears of Constance, nor the grief 

of her lover : 
Tlie (h-eani they had laid out their 

lives in was over. 
Bravely strove the young soldier to 

look in the face 
Of a life, where invisible hands 

seemed to trace 
O'er the threshold, these words . . . 

•' Hope no more ! " 

Unreturned 
Had his love been, the strong manful 

heart would have spurned 
That weakness which suffers a wo- 
man to lie 
At the roots of man's life, like a 

canker, and dry 
And wither the sap of life's purpose. 

Eut there 
Lay the bitterer part of the pain ! 

Could he dare 
To forget he was loved ? that he 

grieved not alone ? 
Recording a love that drew sorrow 

upon 
The woman he loved, for himself 

dare he seek 
Surcease to that sorrow, which thus 

held him weak. 
Beat him down, and destroyed him? 
News reached him indeed, 
Through a comrade, who brought 

him a letter to read 
From the dame who had care of 

Constance (it was one 
To whom, when at Paris, the hoy 

had been known, 
A Frenchman, and friend of the Fau- 
bourg), which said 
Til at Con stance, although never a 

murmur betrayed 



What she suffered, in silence grew 

. paler each day, 
And seemed visibly drooping and 

dying away. 
It was then he sought death. 

XVII. 

Thus the tale ends. 'Twas told 
With such broken, passionate words, 

as unfold 
In glimpses alone, a coiled grief. 

Through each pause 
Of its fitful recital, in raw gusty 

flaws. 
The raiTi shook the canvas, unheed- 
ed ; aloof, 
And unheeded, the night-wind 

around the tent-roof 
At intervals wirbled. And when all 

was said. 
The sick man, exhausted, drooped 

backward his head, 
And fell into a feverish slumber. 

Long while 
Sat the Soeur Seraphine, in deep 

thought. The still smile 
That was wont, angel-wise, to inhab- 
it her face 
And make it like heaven, was fled 

from its place 
In her eyes, on her lips ; and a deep 

sadness there 
Seemed to darken the lines of long 

sorrow and care, 
As low to herself she sighed . . . 

" Hath it, Eugene, 
Been so long, then, the struggle ? . . . 

and yet, all in vain ! 
Nay, not all in vain ! Shall the 

world gain a man. 
And yet Heaven lose a soul ? Have 

I done all I can ? 
Soul to soul, did he say? Soul to 

soul, be it so ! 
And then, — soul of mine, whither? 

whither ? " 

XVIII. 

Large, slow, 
Silent tears in those deep eyes as- 
cended, and fell. 



146 



LUCILE. 



"Here, at least, I have failed not" 

. , . she mused . . . "this is 

well ! " 
She drew from her bosom two letters. 
In one, 
A mother's heart, wild with alarm 

for her son, 
Breathed bitterly forth its despairing 

appeal. 
" The pledge of a love owed to thee, 

O Lucile ! 
The hope of a home saved by thee, — 

of a heart 
Which hath never since then (thrice 

endeared as thou art !) 
Ceased to bless thee, to pray for thee, 

save ! . . . save my son ! 
And if not" . . . the letter went bro- 
kenly on, 
"Heaven help us ! " 

Then followed, from Alfred, a few 
Blotted heart-broken pages. He 

mournfully drew. 
With pathos, the picture of that 

earnest youth. 
So unlike his own : how in beauty 

and truth 
tie had nm-tured that nature, so 

simple and brave ! 
And how he had striven his son's 

youth to save 
From the errors so sadly redeemed 

in his own, 
And so deeply repented : how thus, 

in that son. 
In whose youth he had garnered his 

age, he had seemed 
To be blessed by a pledge that the 

past was redeemed, 
And forgiven. He bitterly went on 

to speak 
Of the boy's baffled love ; in which 

fate seemed to break 
Unawares on his dreams with re- 
tributive pain. 
And tlic> ghosts of the past rose to 

scourge back again 
The hopes of the future. To sue for 

consent 
Pride forbade : and the hope his old 
foe might relent 



Experience rejected ..." My life 

for the boy's! " 
(He exclaimed) ;" " for I die with my 

son, if he dies ! 
Lucile ! Heaven bless you for all you 

have done ! 
Save him, save him, Lucile! save 

my sou ! save my son ! " 

XIX. 

"Ay!" murmured the Sceur Sera- 

phine . . . "heart to heart ! 
There, at least, I have failed not 1 

Fullilled is my part ? 
Accpmplislied my mission ? One act 

crowns the wliole. 
Do I linger ? Nay, be it so, then I 

. . . Soul to soul !" 
She knelt down, and prayed. Still 

the boy slumbered on. 
Dawn broke. The pale nim from 

the bedside was gone. 

XX. 

Meanwhile, 'mid his aides-de-camp, 

busily bent 
O'er the daily reports, in his well- 
ordered tent 
There sits a French General, — 

bronzed by the sun 
And seared by the sands of Algeria. 

One 
Who forth from the wars of the wild 

Kabylee 
Had strangely and rapidly risen to 

be 
The idol, the darling, the dream, and 

the star 
Of the younger French chivalry 

daring in war, 
And wary in council. He entered 

indeed, 
Late in life (and discarding hJa 

Bourbonite creed) 
The Army of France : and liad risen, 

in part, 
From a singular aptitude proved for 

the art 
Of that wild desert warfare of am- 
bush, surprise, 
And stratagem, which to the French 

camp supplies 



LUCILE. 



147 



Its subtlest intelligence ; partly from 

chance ; 
Partly, too, from a name and posi- 
tion which France 
Av'as proud to put forward ; but 

luainl}', in fact. 
From the prudence to plan, and the 

daring to act, 
In frequent emergencies startlingly 

shown. 
To the rank which he now held, — 

intrepidly won 
With many a w^oimd, trenched in 

- many a scar, 
From fierce Milianah and Sidi-Sakh- 

dar. 

XXI. 

All within, and without, that warm 
tent seems to bear 

Smiling token of provident order and 
care. 

All about, a well-fed, well-clad sol- 
diery stands 

In groups round the music of mirth- 
breathing bands. 

In and out of the tent, all day long, 
to and fro. 

The messengers come, and the mes- 
sengers go, 

Upon missions of mercj'^, or errands 
of toil : 

To report how the sapper contends 
with the soil 

In the terrible trench, how the sick 
man is faring 

In the hospital tent : and, combin- 
ing, comparing. 

Constructing, within moves the 
brain of one man, 

Moving all. 
He is bending his brow o'er some 
plan 

For the hospital service, wise, skil- 
ful, humane. 

The officer standing beside liim is 
fain 

To refer to the angel solicitous 
cares 

Of the Sisters of Charity : one he 
declares 



To be known through the camp as a 

seraph of grace : 
He has seen, all have seen her in- 
deed, in each place 
Where suffering is seen, silent, ae 

tive, — the Soeur . . . 
Soeur . . . how do they call her ? 

"Ay, truly, of her 
I have heard much," the General, 

musing, replies ; 
"And we owe her already (imless 

rumor lies) 
The lives of not few of our bravest. 

You mean ... 
Ay, hoM' do they call her ? . . . the 

Sceur — Seraphine, 
(Is it not so ? ) I rarely f(3rget names 

once heard." 

" Yes ; the Soeur Seraphine. Her I 

meant." 

"On my word, 
I have much wished to see her. 1 

fancy I trace. 
In some facts traced to her, some- 
thing more than the grace 
Of an angel : I mean an acute 

human mind, 
Ingenious, constructive, intelligent. 

Find 
And, if possible, let her come to me. 

We shall, 
I think, aid each other. 

" Oi«, mon Gend'ral ; 
I believe she has lately obtained the 

permission 
To tend some sick man in the Second 

Division 
Of our Ally • they say a relation. 

••Ay, so? 
A relation ?" 

" 'Tis said so." 
" The name do you know ?" 
" Non, mon Ge'ne'ral." 

While they spoke yet, there went 
A murmur and stir round the door 

of the tent. 
"A Sister of Charity craves, in a 

case 
Of urgent and serious importance, 

the grace 



I4S 



LUCILE. 



Of briof private speech with the 

(rciieral there. 
Will the General speak with her?" 

" Bid her declare 
Her mission." 

"She will not. She craves to be 
seen 
And be heard." 

" Well, her name then ? " 

" The S<eur Seraphine." 
" Clear the tent. She may enter." 

XXII. 

The tent has been cleared. 
The chieftain stroked moodily some- 
what his beard, 
A sable long silvered : a.nd pressed 

down his brow 
On his hand, heavy veined. All his 

countenance, now 
Unwitnessed, at once fell dejected, 

and dreary, 
As a curtain let fall by a hand that's 

grown weary, 
Into puckers and folds. From his 

lips, unrepressed, 
Steals th' impatient quick sigh, 

which reveals in man's breast 
A conflict concealed, an experience 

at strife 
With itself, — the vexed heart's pass- 
ing protest on life. 
He turned to his papei"s. He heard 

the light tread 
Of a faint foot behind him : and, 

lifting his head. 
Said, "Sit, Holy Sister ! your worth 

is well known 
To the hearts of our soldiers ; nor 

less to my own. 
I have much wished to see you. I 

owe you some thanks : 
In the name of all those you have 

saved to our ranks 
I record them. Sit ! No\v then, your 

mission ? " 

The nun 
Paused silent. The General eyed 

her anon 
More keenly. His aspect grew 

I roubled. A change 



Darkened over his features. He 

muttered . . . . " Strange ! 

strange ! 
Any face should so strongly remind 

me of her I 
Fool ! again the delirium, the dream ! 

does it stir ? 
Does it move as of old ? Psha ! 

" Sit, Sister ! I wait 
Your answer, my time halts but hur- 
riedly. State 
The cause why you seek me ?" 

"The cause ? ay, the cause !" 
She vaguely repeated. Then, after 

a pause, — 
As one who, awaked unawares, 

Avould put back 
The sleep that forever returns in the 

track 
Of dreams which, though scared and 

dispersed, not the less 
Settle back to faint eyelids that yield 

'neath their stress. 
Like doves to a penthouse, — a move- 
ment she made. 
Less toward him than away from 

herself ; drooped her head 
And folded her hands on her bosom: 

long, spare. 
Fatigued, mournful hands ! Not a 

stream of stray hair 
Escaped the pale bands ; scarce more 

pale than the face 
Which they bound and locked up in 

a rigid white case. 
She fixed her eyes on him. There 

crept a vague awe 
O'er his sense, such as ghosts cast. 

" Eugene de Luvois, 
The cause which recalls me again to 

your side 
Is a promise that i-ests unfulfilled," 

she replied. 
"I come to fulfil it." 

He sprang from the place 
Where he sat, pressed his hand, as 

in doubt, o'er his face ; 
And, cautiously feeling each step o'er 

the ground 
That he trod on (as one who walks 

fearing the sound 



LUCILE. 



149 



Of his footstep may startle and scare 

out of sight 
Some strange sleeiiing creature on 

Mhicli lie would light 
Unawares), crept towards her ; one 

heavy hand laid 
On her shoulder in silence ; bent o'er 

• her his head, 
Searched her face with a long look 

of troubled appeal 
Against doubt ; staggered barkward, 

and murmured . . . "Lucile! 
Thus we meet then ? . . . here ! . . 

thus?" 

" Soul to soul, ay, Eugene, 
As I pledged you my word tiiat we 

should meet again. 
Dead, ..." she murmured, "long 

dead ! all that lived in our 

lives, — 
Thine and mine, — saving that which 

ev'n life's self survives. 
The soul ! 'Tis my soul seeks thine 

own. WJiat may reach 
From my life to thy life (so wide 

each from each ! ) 
Save the soul to the soul ? To the 

soul I would speak. 
]\ray I do so?" 
He said (worked and white was his 

cheek 
As he raised it), " Speak to me ! " 

Deep, tender, serene, 
And sad was the gaze which the 

Soeur Seraphine 
Held on him. She spoke. 



As some minstrel may fling, 
Preluding the music yet mute in each 

string, 
A swift hand athwart the hushed 

heart of tlie whole. 
Seeking which note most litly may 

lirst move the soul ; 
And, leaving untroubled the deep 

chords below, 
Move pathetic in numbers remote; — 

even so 
The voice which was moving the 

heart of that man 



Far away from its yet voiceless pur- 
pose began. 

Far away in the pathos remote of 
the past ; 

Until, through her words, rose be- 
fore him, at last. 

Bright and dark in their beauty, the 
hopes that w^ere gone 

Unaccomplished from life. 

He was mute. 

XXIV. 

Sire went on. 

And still further down the dim past 
did she lead 

Each yielding remembrance, far. far 
off, to feed 

'Mid the pastures of youth, in the 
twilight of liope. 

And the valleys of boyhood, the 
fresh-tlowered slope 

Of life's dawning land ! 

'Tis the heart of a boy, 

With its indistinct, passionate pre- 
science of joy ! 

The unproved desire, — the unaimed 
aspiration, — 

The deep conscious life that fore- 
stalls consummation ; 

With ever a tlitting delight, — one 
arm's length 

In advance of the august inward im- 
pulse. 

The strength 

Of the spirit which troubles the seed 
in the sand 

With the birth of the palm-tree ! 
Let ages expand 

The glorious creature ! The ages lie 
shut 

(Safe, see ! ) in the seed, at time's 
signal to put 

Forth their beauty and power, leaf 
by leaf, layer on layer. 

Till the palm strikes the sun, and 
stands broad in blue air. 

So the palm in the palm-seed ! so, 
slowly — so, wrought 

Year by year unpercoived, hope on 
hope, thought by thought, 

Trace the growth of the man from its 
germ in the boy. 



ISO 



LUCILE. 



Ah, but Nature, that nurtures, may 

also destroy ! 
Charm tlie wind and the sun, lest 

some chance intervene ! 
While the leaf's in the bud, while 

the stem's in the gi'een, 
A light bird bends the branch, a light 

breeze breaks the bough, 
Wliicli, if spared by tlie light breeze, 

the liglit bird, may grow 
To baffle the tempest, and rock the 

high ne'st. 
And take botli the bird and the breeze 

to its breast. 
Shall we save a whole forest in spar- 
ing one seed ? 
Save the man in the boy ? in the 

thouglit save the deed ? 
Let the whirlwind uproot the grown 

tree, if it can ! 
Save the seed from the north-wind. 

So let the grown man 
Face out fate. Spare tlie man-seed 

in youth. 

He was dumb. 
She went one step fm-ther. 



Lo ! manhood is come. 
And love, the wild song-bird, hath 

flown to the tree, 
And the wliirlwind comes after. 

Now prove we, and see : 
Wliat shade from the leaf ? what 

support from the brancli ? 
Sjn-eads the leaf broad and fair ? 

holds the bough strong and 

staunch ? 
There, he saw himself, — dark, as he 

stood on that night. 
The last when they met and they 

parted : a sight 
For heaven to mourn o'er, for hell to 

rejoice ! 
An ineiTable tenderness troubled her 

voice ; 
It grew weak, and a sigh broke it 

thrmi<^:h. 

Then he said 
(Never looking at her, never lifting 

his head, 



As though, at his feet, there lay 

visibly hurled 
Those fragments)," It was not a love, 

'twas a world, 
'Twas a life that lay ruined, Lucile! " 



She went on. 
"So be it ! Perish Babel, arise 

Babylon ! 
From ruins like these rise the fanes 

that shall last. 
And to build up the future heaven 

shatters the past." 
" Ay," he moodily murmured, "and 

who cares to scan 
The heart's perished world, if the 

world gains u man ? 
From the past to tlie present, though 

late, I appeal ; 
To the nun Serapliine, from the wo- 
man Lucile ! " 



Lucile ! . . . the old name, — the 
old self ! silenced long : 

Heard once more ! felt once more ! 
As some soul to the throng 

Of invisible spirits admitted, baptized 

By deatli to a new name and nature, 
— surprised 

'Mid the songs of the seraphs, hears 
faintly, and far. 

Some voice from the earth, left be- 
low a dim star, 

Calling to her forlornly ; and (sad- 
dening the psalms 

Of the angels, and piercing the Para- 
dise imlms !) 

The name borne 'mid earthly be- 
love'ds on earth 

Sighed above some lone grave in the 
land of her birth ; — 

So that one word . . . Lucile ! . . . 
stirred the Soeur Seraphine, 

For a moment. Anon she resumed 
her serene 

And concentrated calm. 

"Let the Nun, then, retrace 

The life of the Soldier !" . . . she 
said, with a face 



LUCILE. 



151 



That glowed, gladdening her words. 
" To the present I come : 

Leave the Past." 
There her voice rose, and seemed 
as when some 

Pale Priestess proclaims from her 
temple the praise 

Of the hero whose brows she is 
crowning with bays. 

Step by step did she follow his path 
from the place 

Where their two paths diverged. 
Year by year did she trace 

(Familiar with all) his, the soldier's 
existence. 

Her words were of trial, endvirance, 
resistance ; 

Of the leaguer around this besieged 
world of ours : 

And the same sentinels that ascend 
the same towers 

And report the same foes, the same 
fears, the same strife, 

Waged alike to the limits of each 
human life. 

She went on to speak of the lone 
moody lord, 

Shut up in his lone moody halls : 
every word 

Held the weight of a tear : she re- 
corded the good 

HeJj.ad patiently wrought through a 
whole neighborhood ; 

And the blessing that lived on the 
lips of the poor, 

Ay the peasant's hearthstone, or the 
cottager's door. 

There she paused : and her accents 
seemed dipped in the hue 

Of his own sombre heart, as the pic- 
ture she drew 

Of the poor, proud, sad spirit, reject- 
ing love's wages, 

Yet working love's work ; reading 
backwards life's pages 

For penance ; and stubbornly, many 
a time. 

Both missing the moral, and mar- 
ring the rliyme. 

Then slie spoke of the soldier ! . . , 
the man's work and fame, 



The pride of a nation, a world's just 

acclaim ! 
Life's inward approval I 

XXVIII. 

Her voice reached his heart. 
And sank lower. She spoke of her- 
self : how, apart 
And unseen, — far away, — she had 

watched, year by year, 
With how many a blessing, how 

many a tear. 
And how many a prayer, every stage 

in the strife : 
Guessed the thought in the deed : 

traced the love in the life : 
Blessed the man in the man's work ! 

" Thy work . . . O. not mine ! 
Thine, Lucile !" ... he exclaimed 

. . . " all the worth of it thine 
If worth there be in it ! " 

Her answer conveyed 
His reward, and her own ; joy that 

cannot be said 
Alone by the voice . . . eyes — face 

— spoke silently : 
All the woman, one grateful emotion ! 
And she 
A iJoor Sister of Charity ! hers a life 

spent 
In one silent effoi't for others ! . . . 
She bent 
Her divine face above him, and filled 

up his heart 
With the look that glowed from it. 

Then slow, with soft art, 
Fixed her aim, and moved to it. 

XXIX. 

He, the soldier humane, 

He, the hero ; whose heart hid in 
glory the pain 

Of a youth disappointed ; whose life 
had made known 

The value of man's life ! . . . that 
youth overthrown 

And retrieved, had it left him no 
pity for youth 

In another ? his own life of strenu- 
ous truth 



152 



LUCILE. 



Accomplished in act, had it taught 

him no care 
For the life of another ? . . . O no I 

everywhere 
In the camp which she moved 

through, she came face to face 
With some noble token, some gener- 
ous trace 
Of his active humanity . . . 

" Well," he replied, 
"If it be so?" 

" I come from the solemn bedside 
Of a man that is dying," she said. 

" While we speak 
A life is in jeopardy." 

'' Quick then ! you seek 
Aid or medicine, or what ?" 

" 'Tis not needed," she said. 
"Medicine ? yes, for the mind ! 'Tis 

a heart that needs aid ! 
You, Eugene de Luvois, you (and 

you only) can [save it ? " 

Save the life of this man. Will you 

"Whatman? 
How ? . . . where ? . . . can you 

ask ? " 

She went rapidly on 
To her object in brief vivid words 

. . . The young son 
Of Matilda and Alfred — the boy ly- 
ing there 
Half a mile from that tent-door — the 

father's despair. 
The mother's deep anguish — the 

jn'ide of the boy 
In the father — the father's one hope 

and one joy 
In the son : — the son now — wounded, 

dying ! She told 
Of the father's stern struggle with 

life : the boy's bold. 
Pure, and beautiful natm-e : the fair 

life before him 
If that life were but spared . . . yet 

a word might restore him ! 
The boy's Ijroken love for the niece 

of Eugene ! 
Its pathos : the girl's love for him ; 

how, half slain 
In his tent she had found him ; won 

from him the tale ; 



Sought to nurse back his life ; foimd 
her etforts still fail ; 

Beaten back by a love that was 
stronger than life ; 

Of how bravely till then he had 
stood in that strife 

Wherein England and France in 
their best blood, at last. 

Had bathed from remembrance the 
wounds of the past. 

And shall nations be nobler than 
men ? Are not great 

Men the models of nations ? For 
what is a state 

But the many's confused imitation 
of one ? 

Shall he, the fair hero of France on 
the son 

Of his ally seek vengeance, destroy- 
ing xje reliance 

An innocent life, — liere when Eng- 
land and France 

Have forgiven the sins of their 
fathers of yore, 

And baptized a new hope in their 
sons' recent gore ? 

She went on to tell how the boy had 
clung still [until 

To life, for the sake of life's uses, 

From his weak hands the strong ef- 
fort dropped, stricken down 

By the news that the heart of Con- 
stance, like his own. 

Was breaking beneath . . . 
But there " Hold ! " he exclaimed, 

Interrupting, "forbear!" . . . his 
whole face was inflamed 

With the heart's swarthy thunder 
which yet, while she spoke. 

Had been gatlieriug silent, — at last 
the storm broke 

In grief or in wrath . . . 

" 'Tis to him, then," he cried, . . . 

Checking suddenly short the tu- 
multuous stride, 

" That I owe these late greetings, — 
for him you are here, — 

For his sake you seek me, — for him, 
it is clear. 

You have deigned at the last to be- 
think you again 



LUCILE. 



153 



Of this long-forgotten existence !" 

" Eugene ! " 
"Ha! fool that I was!" ... he 

went on, . . . " and just now, 
Wliile you spoke yet, my heart was 

beginning to grow 
Almost boyish again, almost sure of 

one, i'riend ! 
Yet this was the meaning of all, — 

this the end ! 
Be it so ! There's a sort of slow 

justice (admit ! ) 
In this, — that the word that man's 

finger hath writ [last. 

In fire on my heart, I return him at 

Let him learn that word, — Never ! " 

" Ah, still to the past 

Must the present be vassal?'- she 

said. " In the hour 
We last parted I lu-ged you to jjut 

forth the power 
Which I felt to be yours, in the con- 
quest of life. 
Toiu'S, the promise to strive: mine, — 

to watch o'er tlie strife. 
I foresaw you would conquer; you 

/mi-e conquered nnich, 
Much, indeed, that is noble ! I hail 

. it as such, 
And am here to record and applaud 

it. I saw 
Not the less in your nature. Eugene 

de Envois, . 
One peril, — one point where I feared 

you would fail 
To subdue that worst foe which a 

man can assail. — 
Himself : and I promised that, if I 

should see 
My champion once falter, or bend 

the brave knee. 
That moment would bring me again 

to Ills side. 
That moment is come ! for that 

peril M'as pride, 
And you falter. I jjlead for your- 
self, and one other, 
For that gentle child without father 

or mother. 
To whom you are both. I plead, 

soldier of France, 



For your own nobler nature, — and 

plead for Constance ! " 
At the sound of that name he avert- 
ed his head. 
"Constance ! . . . Ay, she entered 

my lone life " (he said) 
" When its sun \\as long set ; and 

hung over its night 
Her own starry childhood. I have 

but that light. 
In the midst of much darkness ! 

Who names me but she 
With titles of love ? and what rests 

there for me 
In the silence of age save the voice 

of that child ? 
The child of my own better life, un- 

defiled ! 
My creature, carved out of my heart 

of hearts !" 

" Say," 
Said the Sceur Seraphine, — " are you 

able to lay 
Your hand as a knight on yom: heart 

as a man 
And swear that, whatever may hap- 
pen, you can 
Feel assured for the life you thus 

cherish ? " 

"How so?" 
He looked up. " If the boy should 

die thus ? " 

" Yes, I know 
AVhat yoiu' look would imply . . . 

this sleek stranger forsooth ! 
Because on his cheek was the red 

rose of youth 
The heart of my niece must break 

for it !" 

She cried, 
" Nay, but hear me yet further ! " 

With slow heavy stride, 
Unheeding her words, he was pacing 

the lent, [he went. 

He was muttering low to himself as 
"Ay, these young things lie safe in 

our heart just so long 
As their wings are in growing ; and 

when these are strong 
They break it, and farewell ! the 

bird flies ! " . . . 



IS4 



LUCILE. 



The nun 
Laid lier hand on the soldier, and 

niuriuurcd, " The sun 
Is descending, life fleets while we 

talk thus ! O, yet 
Let this day upon one final victory 

set. 
And complete a life's conquest !" 

He said, " Understand ! 
If Constance wed tlie sou of this 

man, by whose hand 
My heart hath been robbed, she is 

lost to my life ! 
c!an her home be my home ? Can I 

claim iu tlie wife 
Of that man's son the child of my 

age ? At her side 
Shall lie stand on my hearth ? 

Shall I sue to the bride 
Of . . . enough ! 

" All, and you immemorial halls 
Of my Xorman forefathers, whose 

shadow yet falls 
On my fancy, and fuses hope, 

memory, past. 
Present, — all, in one silence ! old 

trees to the blast 
Of the North Sea repeating the tale 

of old days, 
Nevermore, nevermore in the wild 

bosky ways 
Shall I hear through your umbrage 

ancestral the wind 
Prophesy as of yore, when it shook 

the deep mind 
Of my boyhood, with whispers from 

out the far years 
Of love, fame, the raptures life cools 

down with tears ! 
Henceforth shall the tread of a Var- 

grave alone 
■Rouse your echoes ? " [son 

" O, think not," she said, "of the 
Of the man whom unjustly you hate ; 

only think 
Of this young human creature, that 

cries from tlie brink 
Of a grave to your mercy 1 

" iiecall your own words 
(Words my memory mournfully ever 

records !) 



How with love may be wrecked a 

whole life ! then, Eugene, 
Look with me (still those words in 

our ears !) once again 
At this young soldier sinking from 

life here, — dragged down 
By the weight of the love in his 

heart : no renown, 
No fame comforts Ixlm 1 nations 

shout not above 
The lone grave down to which he is 

bearing the love 
Which life has rejected ! Will you 

stand apart '? 
You, with sucli a love's memory 

deep in your heart ! 
You the hero, whose life hath per- 
chance been led on 
Through the deeds it hath wrought 

to the fame it liatli won. 
By recalling the visions and dreams 

of a youth. 
Such as lies at your door now : who 

have but, in truth. 
To stretch forth a hand, to speak 

only one word, 
And by that word you rescue a 

life ! " 

He was stirred. 
Still he sought to put from him the 

cup ; bowed his face 
On his hand ; and anon, as though 

wishing to chase 
With one angry gesture his own 

thoughts aside. 
He sprang up, brushed past her, and 

bitterly cried, 
" No ! — Constance wed a Vargravc ! 

— I cannot consent !" 
Then uprose the Soeur Seraphine. 

The low tent, 
In her sudden uprising, seemed 

dwarfed by the height 
From which those imperial eyes 

poured the light [him. 

Of their deep silent sadness upon 

No wonder 

He felt, as it were, his own stature 

shrink imder 
The compulsion of that grave re- 

gard ! For between 



LUCILE. 



155 



Tbe Due do Luvois and the Soeur 

Seraphiiie 
At that moment there rose all the 

height of one soul 
O'er another ; she looked down on 

him from the whole 
Lonely length of a life. There were 

sad nights and days, 
There were long months and years 

in that heart-searching gaze ; 
And her voice, when she spoke, with 

sharp pathos thrilled through, 
And transfixed him. 

"Eugene de Luvois, hut for you, 
I might have been now, — not this 

wandering nun. 
But a motlier, a wife, — pleading, not 

for the son 
Of another, but blessing some child 

of my own, 
His, — the man's that I once loved! . . 

Hush ! that which is done 
I regret not. I bi-eathe no re- 
proaches. That's best 
Which God sends. 'Twas His will : 

it is mine. And' the rest 
Of that riddle I will not look back 

to. He reads 
In your heart, — He that judges of 

all thoughts and deeds, 
With eyes, mine forestall not ! This 

only I say : 
You have not the right (read it, you, 

as you may !) 
To say . . . ' I am the wronged.' "... 
" Have I wronged thee ? — wronged 

thee ! " 
He faltered, "Lucile, ah, Lucile ! " 
"Nay, not me," 
She murmured, "but man! The 

lone nun standing here 
Has no claim upon earth, and is 

passed from the spliere 
Of earth's wrongs and earth's repar- 
ations. But she, 
The dead woman, Lucile, she whose 

grave is in me, 
Demands from her grave reparation 

to man. 
Reparation to God. Heed, O heed, 

while you can. 



This voice from the grave ! " 

" Hiish ! " he moaned, " I obey 
The Soeur Seraphine. There, Lucile ! 

let this pay 
Every debt that is due to that grave. 

Now lead on : 
I follow you, Soeur Seraphine ! . . . . 

To the son 
Of Lord Alfred Vargrave . . . and 

then," . . . 

As he spoke 
He lifted the tent-door, and down 

the dun smoke 
Pointed out the dark bastions, with 

batteries crowned. 
Of the city beneath them . . . 

"Then, there, underground. 
And valete et plaudite, soon as may 

be! 
Let the old tree go down to the earth, 

— the old tree. 
With the worm at its heart ! Lay 

the axe to the root ! 
Who will miss the old stump, so we 

save the young shoot ? 
A Vargrave ! . . , this pays all . . . 

Lead on ! ... in the seed 
Save the forest ! . . . 
" I follow . . . forth, forth ! where 

you lead." 



The day was declining ; a day sick 

and damp. 
In a blank ghostly glare shone the 

bleak ghostly camp 
Of the English. Alone in his dim, 

spectral tent 
(Himself the wan spectre of youth), 

with eyes bent 
On the daylight departing, the sick 

man was sitting 
Upon his low pallet. These thoughts, 

vaguely flitting, 
Crossed the silence between him and 

death, which seemed near. 
— " Pain o'erreaches itself, so is 

balked ! else, how bear 
This intense and intolerable soli- 
tude, 



156 



LUCII.E. 



With its eye on my heart, and its 

hand on my blood ? 
Pulse by pulse ! Day goes down : 

yet she comes not tisain. 
Other suttering, doubtless," where 

hope is more plain, 
'^laims her elsewhere. I die, strange ! 

and scarcely feel sad. 
O, to think of Constance tlms, and 

not to go mad ! 
But Death, it would seem, dulls the 

sense to his own 
Dull doings ..." 

XXXI. 

Between those sick eyes and the 
sun 
A shadow fell thwart. 

XXXII. 

'Tis the pale mm once more ! 
But who stands at her side, mute 

and dark in the door ? 
How oft had he watched through 

the glory and gloom 
Of the battle", with long, longing 

looks that dim plume 
Which now (one stray simbeam 

upon it) shook, stooped 
To where the tent-curtain, dividing, 

was looped ! 
How that stern face had haunted 

and hovered about 
The dreams it still scared ! through 

what fond fear and doubt 
Had the boy yearned in heart to the 

hero"! (What's like 
A boy's love for some famous 

man?) ... O, to strike 
A wild path through the battle, down 

striking perchance 
Some rash foenian too near the great 

soldier of France, 
And so fall in his glorious re- 
gard ! . . . Oft, how oft 
Ihid his heart flashed this hope out, 

whilst watching aloft 
The dim battle that plume dance and 

dart. — never seen 
o near till this moment ! how eager 

to glean 



Every stray word, dropped through 
the camp-babble in praise 

Of his hero, — each tale of old ven- 
turous days 

In the desert ! And now . . . could 
he speak out his heart 

Face to face with that man ere he 
died ! 



With a start 
The sick soldier sprang up : the 

blood sprang up in him. 
To his throat, and o'erthrew him: 

he reeled back : a dim 
Sanguine haze filled his eyes ; in his 

ears I'ose the din 
And rush, as of cataracts loosened 

within. 
Through which he saw faintly, and 

heard, the pale nun 
(Looking larger than life, where she 

stood in the sun) 
Point to him and murmur, "Be- 
hold ! " Then that plume 
Seemed to wave like a fire, and fade 

off in the gloom 
Wliich momently put out the world. 

XXXIV. 

To his side 

Moved the man the boy dreaded yet 

loved . . " Ah!" . . he sighed, 

"The smooth brow, the fair Var- 

grave face ! and those eyes, 
All the mother's I The old things 
again ! 

"Do not rise. 
You suffer, young man ?" 
The Boy. 

Sir, I die. 

The Duke. 

Not so young ! 
The Boy. 
So young ? yes ! and yet I have 

tangled among 
The frayed warp and woof of this 
brief life of mine 




'The sick soldier sprang up." 



LUCILE. 



IS7 



Other Ih^es than my own. Could my 

death but untwine 
The vext skein . . . but it will not. 

X"es, Duke, young — so young ! 
And I knew you not ? yet I have done 

you a wrong 
Irreparable ! . . . late, too late to 

repair. 
If I knew any means . . . but I know 

none ! . . . I swear, 
If this broken fraction of time could 

extend [end 

Into infinite, lives of atonement, no 
Would seem too remote for my grief 

(could that be !) 
To include it ! Xot too late, how- 
ever, for me 
To entreat : is it too late for you to 

forgive ? 

The Duke. 
You wrong — my forgiveness — ex- 
ph'iin. 

The Boy. 
Could I live ! 
Such a very few hours left to life, 

yet I shrink, 
I falter ! . . . Yes, Duke, your for- 

giv(!ness I think 
Should free my soul lience. 

Ah ! j'ou could not surmise 
That a boy's Ideating heart, burniiig 

thoughts, longiug eyes 
Were following you evermore (heed- 
ed not I) 
While the battle was flowing betvreen 

us : nor what 
Eager, duljious footsteps at nightfall 

oft went 
With the wind and the rain, round 

and round your blind tent. 
Persistent and wild as the M-ind and 

the rain, 
Unnoticed as these, weak as tliese, 

and as vain ! 
O, liow obdurate tlieu looked your 

tent ! The waste air 
Grew stern at the gleam which said 

. . . "Off ! he is there!" 
1 know not what merciful mystery 

now 



Brings you here, whence the man 

whom you see lying low 
Other footsteps (not those !) must 

soon bear to tbe grave. 
But death is at band, and the few 

words I have 
Yet to speak, I must speak them at 

once. 

Duke, I swear. 
As I lie here (Death's angel too close 

not to hear !) 
That I meant not this wrong to you. 

Due de Luvois, 
I loved your niece — loved ? why, I 

lotc. her ! I saw, 
And, seeing, how could I but love 

her ? I seemed 
Born to love her. Alas, were that 

all ! had I dreamed 
Of this love's cruel consequence as 

it rests now 
Ever fearfully present before me, I 

vow 
Tliat the secret, unknown, had gone 

down to tbe tomb 
Into which I descend . . . O why, 

wliilst there was room 
In life left for warning, had no one 

the heart 
To warn me ? Had anyone whis- 
pered ..." Depart !" 
To the hope the whole world seemed 

in league then to nurse ! 
Had anyone hinted ..." Beware 

of the curse 
AVhich is coming !" There was not 

a voice raised to tell, 
Not a hand moved to warn from tlic 

blow ei'c it fell. 
And then . . . then the blow fell on 

both I This is why 
I implore you to pardon that great 

injury 
Wrought on lier, and, through her, 
wrought on you, Heaven knows 
How unwittingly I 

The Duke. 

Ah ! . . and, young soldier, suppose 
That I came here to seek, not grant, 
pardon ? — 



TUE 



liov. 

Of whom ? 



The Duke, 
Of yourself. 

The Boy. 
Duke, I bear in my heart to the 

tomb 
No boyish resentment ; not one 

lonely thought 
That honors you not. In all this 

there is nought 
'Tis for me to forgive. 

Every glorious act 
Of your great life starts forward, an 

eloquent fact. 
To confirm in ray boy's heart its 

faith in your own. 
And have 1 not lioarded, to ponder 

iipon, 
A hundred great Acts from your life ? 

Nay, all these, 
Were tliey so many lying and false 

witnesses, 
Does tliere rest not one voice, which 

was never imtrue ? 
I believe in Constance, Duke, as she 

does in you ! 
In this great world around us, wher- 
ever we turn. 
Some grief irremediable we discern ; 
And yet — there sits God, calm in 

Heaven above ! 
Do we trust one whit less in His just- 
ice or love ? 
I judge not. 

The Duke. 
Enougli! hear at last, tlien, the truth. 
Your father and I, — foes we were in 

our youth. 
It matters not why. Yet thus much 

understand : 
The hope of my youth was signed 

out by his hand, 
I was not of those whom the buffets 

of fate 
Tame and teach : and my heart 

buried slain love in hate. 
If your own frank young heart, yet 

imconscious of all 



Which turns the heart's blood in ita 
springtide to gall. 

And unable to guess even aught that 
the furrow 

Across these gray brows hides of sin 
or of sorrow, 

Comprehends not tlie evil and grief 
of my life, 

'Twill at least comprehend how in- 
tense was the strife 

Whicli is closed in this act of atone- 
ment, whereby 

I seek in the son of my youth's 
enemy 

The friend of my age. Let the pres- 
ent release 

Here acquitted the past 1 In the 
name of my niece, 

Wliom for my life in yours as a host- 
age I give. 

Are you great enough, boy, to for- 
give me, — and live ? 

Wliilst he spoke thus, a doubtful tu- 
multuous joy 
Chased its fleeting effects o'er the 

face of the boy : 
As when some stormy moon, in a 

long cloud confined, 
Struggles outwai-d through shadows, 

the varying wind 
Alternates, and bursts, self-sur- 
prised, from her prison. 
So that slow joy grew clear in his 

face. He liad risen 
To answer tlie Duke ; but strength 

failed every limb ; 
A strange, happy feebleness trembled 

through him. 
With a faint cry of rapturous wonder, 

he sank [near. 

On tlie breast of the nun, who stood 

" Yes, boy ! thank 
This guardian angel," the Duke said. 

" I — you, 
We owe all to her. Crown her work. 

Live ! be true 
To your young life's fair promise, 

and live for her sake ! " 
"Yes, Duke : I will live. I must 

Uve, — live to make 



k 



LUCILE. 



159 



My whole life the answer you claim," 

the boy said, 
" For joy does not kill ! " 

Back again the faint head 
Declined on the nun's gentle bosom. 

She saw 
His lips quiver, and motioned the 

Duke to withdraw 
Ajid leave them a moment together. 
He eyed 
Them both with a wistful regard ; 

turned, and sighed. 
And lifted the tent-door, and passed 

from the tent. 

XXXV. 

Like a furnace, the fervid, intense 
Occident 

From its hot seething levels a great 
glare struck up 

On the sick metal sky. And, as out 
of a cup 

Some witch watches boiling wild por- 
tents arise, 
.Monstrous clouds, massed, misshap- 
en, and tinged with strange 
dyes. 

Hovered over the red fume, and 
changed to weird shapes 

As of snakes, salamanders, efts, liz- 
ards, storks, apes. 

Chimeras, and hydras : whilst — ever 
the same — 

In the midst of all these (creatures 
fused by his flame, 

And changed by his influence !) 
changeless, as when. 

Ere he lit down to deatlv generations 
of men, 

O'er that crude and ungainly crea- 
tion, which there 

With wild shapes this cloud-world 
seemed to mimic in air. 

The eye of Heaven's all-judging wit- 
ness, he shone. 

And sJiall shine on the ages we reach 
not, — the sun ! 

XXXVI. 

Nature posted her parable thus in 

the skies. 
And the man's heart bore witness. 

Life's vapors arise 



And fall, pass and change, group 

themselves and revolve 
Round the great central life, which. 

is Love : these dissolve 
And resume themselves, here assmue 

beauty, there terror ; 
And the phantasmagoria of infinite 

error, 
And endless complexity, lasts but a 

while ; 
Life's self, the immortal, immutable 

smile 
Of God, on the soul, in the deep 

heart of Heaven 
Lives changeless, unchanged : and 

our morning and even 
Are earth's alterations, not Heaven's. 

XXX vri. 

While he yet 
Watched the skies, with this thought 

in his heart ; while he set 
Thus unconsciously all his life forth 

in his mind. 
Summed it up, searched it out, proved 

it vapor and wind. 
And embraced the new life which 

that liour had revealed, — 
Love's life, which earth's life had 

defaced and concealed ; 
Lucile left the tent and stood by him. 
Her tread 
Aroused him ; and, turning towards 

lier, he said : 
" O Sana- Seraphine, are you 
happy ? " 

" Eugene, 
What is happier than to have hoped 

not in vain ? " 
She answered, — " And you ? '■* 
"Yes." 
" You do not repent ? " 
"No." 
" Thank Heaven ! " she mur- 
mured. He musingly bent 
His looks on the sunset, and some- 
what apart 
Where he stood, sighed, as though to 

his innermost heart, 
" O blessed are they, amongst whom 
I was not, 



[6o 



LUCILE. 



Whose morning unclouded, without 
stain or spot, 

rre.licts a pure evening ; who, sun- 
like, in light 

Have traversed, unsullied, the world, 
and set bright ! " 

But she in response, " Mark yon ship 

far away. 
Asleep on the wave, in the last light 

of (lay, 
Witli all ils hushed thunders shut 

up ! Would you know 
A thought which came to me a few 

days ago. 
Whilst watching those ships ? . . . 

When the great Ship of Life, 
Surviving, though shattered, the 

tumult and strife 
Of earth's angry element, — masts 

bi-oken short, 
Decks drenched, bulwarks beaten, — 

drives safe into port. 
When tlie Pilot of Galilee, seen on 

tbe-strand. 
Stretches over the waters a welcom- 
ing hand ; 
When, heeding no longer the sea's 

baffled roar. 
The mariner tm*ns to his rest ever- 
more ; 
What will then be the answer the 

helmsman must give ? 
Will it be ... ' Lo our log-book ! 

Thus once did we live 
In the zones of the South ; thus we 

traversed the seas 
Of tlie Orient ; thei'e dwelt with the 

Ilesperides ; 
Thence followed the west-wind ; 

here, eastward we turned ; 
The stars failed us there ; just here 

land we discerned 
On our lee ; there the storm over- 
took us at last ; 
That day went the bowsprit, the 

next day the mast ; 
There the mermen came round us, 

and there we saw bask 
A siren ? ' The Captain of Port will 

he ask 



Any one of such questions ? I can- 
not think so ! 

But . . . ' What is the last Bill of 
Health you can show ? ' 

Not — How fared the soul through the 
trials she passed ? 

But — What is the state of that soul 
at the last ? " 

"May it be so !" he sighed. "There 1 

the sun drops, behold ! " 
And indeed, whilst he spoke, all the 

purjjle and gold 
In the west had tiu-ned ashen, save 

one fading strip 
Of light that yet gleamed from the 

dark nether lip 
Of a long reef of cloud ; and o'er 

sullen ravines 
And ridges the raw damps were 

hanging white screens 
Of melancholy mist. 

"Nunc dimittis 1 " she said. 
" O God of the living ! whilst yet 

'mid the dead 
And the dying we stand here alive, 

and thy days 
Returning, admit space for prayer 

and for praise. 
In both these confirm us ! 

" The helmsman, Eugbne, 
Needs the compass to steer by. Pray 

always. Again 
We two part : each to work out 

Heaven's will : you, I trust. 
In the world's ample witness ; and I, 

as I must. 
In secret and silence : you, love, 

fame, await ; 
Me, sorrow and sickness. We meet 

at one gate 
When all's over. The ways they are 

niany and wide. 
And seldom are two ways the same. 

Side by side 
May we stand at the same little door 

when all's done ! 
The ways they are many, the end it 

is one. 
He that knocketh shall enter : wlio 

asks shall obtain : 



LUCILE. 



i6i 



And who seeketh, he findeth. Re- 
member, Eugene ! " 

She turned to depart. 

" Whither ? wliither ? " . . . he 
said. 

She stretched forth her hand where, 
already outspread 

On the darkened horizon, remotely 
they saw 

The French camp-fires kindling. 

" O Due de Luvois, 

See yonder vast host, with its mani- 
fold heart 

Made as one man's by one hope ! 
That hope 'tis your i^art 

To aid towards achievement, to save 
from reverse : 

Mine, through suffering to soothe, 
and through sickness to nurse. 

I go to my work : you to yours." 



Whilst she spoke. 

On the wide wasting evening there 
distantly broke 

The low roll of musketry. Straight- 
way, anon, 

From the dim Flag-staff Battery bel- 
lowed a gun. 

" Our chasseurs are at it !" he mut- 
tered. 

She turned. 

Smiled, and passed up the twilight. 
Lie faintly discerned 

Her form, now and then, on the flat 
lurid sky 

Rise, and sink, and recede through 
the mists ; by and by 

The vapors closed roimd, and he saw 
her no more. 

XXXIX. 

Nor shall we. For her mission, ac- 
complished, is o'er. 

The mission of genius on earth ! To 
uplift. 

Purify, and confirm by its own gra- 
cious gift. 

The world, in despite of the world's 
dull endeavor 
11 



To degrade, and drag down, and op- 
pose it forever. 

The mission of genius : to watch, and 
to wait, 

To renew, to redeem, and to regen- 
erate. 

The mission of woman on earth ! to 
give birth 

To the mercy of Heaven descending 
on earth. 

The mission of woman : permitted 
to bruise 

The head of the serpent, and sweetly 
infuse, 

Through tlie sorrow and sin of earth's 
registered curse, 

The blessing which mitigates all : 
born to nurse. 

And to soothe, and to solace, to help 
and to heal 

The sick- world that leans on her. 
This was Lucile. 



A power hid in pathos : a fire veiled 

in cloud : 
Yet still burning outward : a branch 

which, though bowed 
By the bird in its passage, springs 

upward again : 
Through all symbols I search for her 

sweetness — in vain ! 
Judge her love by her life. For our 

life is but love 
In act. Pure was hers : and the dear 

God above. 
Who knows what His creatures have 

need of for life. 
And whose love includes all loves, 

through much patient strife 
Led her soul into peace. Love, 

though love may be given 
In vain, is yet lovely. Her own na- 
tive heaven 
More clearly she mirrored, as life's 

troubled dream 
Wore away ; and love sighed into 

rest, like a stream 
That breaks its heart over wild rocks 

toward the shore 



l62 



THE APPLE OF LIFE. 



Of the great sea which hushes it up 
evermore 

With its little wild wailing. No 
stream from its source 

Flows seaward, how lonely soever its 
covu'se, 

But what some land is gladdened. 
No star ever rose 

And set, without influence some- 
where. Who knows 

Wliat earth needs from earth's low- 
est creature ? No life 

Can be i>ure in its purpose and strong 
in its strife 

And all life not be purer and strong- 
er thereby. 

The spirits of just men made perfect 
on high, 

The army of martyrs who stand by 
the Throne 

And gaze into the Face that makes 
glorious their own, 

Know this, surely, at last. Honest 
love, honest sorrow. 

Honest work for the day, honest hope 
for the morrow, 



Are these worth nothing more than 

the hand they make weary. 
The heart they have saddened, the 

life they leave dreary ? 
Hush ! the sevenfold heavens to the 

voice of the Spirit 
Echo : He that o'ercometh shall al' 

things inherit. 



The moon was, in fire, carried up 

through the fog ; 
The loud fortress barked at her like 

a chained dog. 
The horizon pulsed flame, the air 

sound. All without, 
War and winter, and twilight, and 

terror, and doubt ; 
All within, light, warmth, calm ! 

In the twilight, long while 
Eugene de Luvois with a deep, 

thoughtful smile 
Lingered, looking, and listening, 

lone by the tent. 
At last he withdreV, and night 

closed as he went. 



THE APPLE OF LIFE. 



Fnoji the river Euphrates, the river whose source is in Paradise, far 
As red Egypt, — sole lord of the land and the sea, 'twixt the home of the 

star 
That is born in the blush of the East, and the porch of the chambers of 

rest 
Where the great sea is girded w'ith fire, and Orion returns in the West, 
And the ships come and go in grand silence, — King Solomon reigned. 

And behold, 
In that time there was everywhere silver as common as stones be, and 

gold 
That for ])lcnty was 'counted as silver, and cedar as sycamore-trees 
That ai'e found in the vale, for abundance. For God to the King gave all 

these, 
Witl: glory exceeding ; moreover all kings of the earth to him came, 
Because of his wisdom, to hear him. So great was King Solomon's 
fame. 



THE APPLE OF LIFE. 163 

And for all this the King's soul was sad. And his heart said within 
him, " Alas ! 

For man dies ! if his glory abideth, himself from his glory shall pass. 

And that which remainetli behind him, he seeth it not any more : 

For how shall he know what comes after, who knoweth not what went 
before ? 

I have planted me gardens and vineyards, and gotten me silver and ! 
gold. 

And my hand from whatever my heart hath desired I did not not with- 
hold : S 

And what profit have I in the works of my hands which I take not away ? ^ 

I have searche'd out wisdom and knowledge : and what do they profit me, t 
they ? ' 

As the fool dieth, so doth the wise. What is gathered is scattered again. ; 

As the breath of the beasts, even so is the breath of the children of men : 

And the same thing befalleth them both. And not any man's soul is his 
own." 

This he thought, as he sat in his garden and watched the great sun ! 

going down ; 

In the glory thereof ; and the earth and the sky by the beam of the same j 
Were clothed with the gladness of color, and bathed in the beauty of 

flame. 
And "Behold," said the King, " in a moment the glory shall vanish !" j 

Even then, ; 

While he spake, he was 'ware of a man drawing near him, who seemed to ; 

his ken j 

(By the hair in its blackness like flax that is burned in the hemp-dresser's j 

shed, ! 

And the brow's smoky hue, and the smouldering eyeball more livid than 

lead) 
As the sons of the land lies under the sword of the Cherub whose wing 
Wraps in wrath the shut gateways of Paradise. He, being come to the 

King, 
Seven times made obeisance before him. To whom, "What art thou," 

the King cried, 
" That thus unannounced to King Solomon comest ? " The man, spread- 
ing wide 
The palm of his right hand, showed in it an apple yet bright from the 

Tree 
In whose stem springs the life never-failing which Sin lost to Adam, 

when he. 
Tasting knowledge forbidden, found death in the fruit of it. . . . So doth 

the Giver 
Evil gifts to the evil apportion. And " Hail ! let the King live forever I" 
Bowing down at the feet of the monarch, and laughingly, even as one 
Whose meaning, in joy or in jest, hovers hid 'twixt the word and the 

tone. 
Said the stranger, " For lo ye " (and lightly he dropped in the hand of the 

King 
That apple), " from 'twixt the four rivers of Eden, God gave me to bring 



To his servaut King Solomon, even to my lord that on Israel's throne 
He hath 'stablisht, this fruit from the Tree in whoso branch Life abideth : 

for none 
Shall taste death, having tasted this apple." 

And therewith he vanished. 

Remained 

lu the hand of tlie King the life-apple : ambrosial of breath, golden-grained, 
Kosy-bright as a star dipt in simset. The King turned it o'er, and perused 
The fruit, which, alluring his lip, in his hand lay mitasted. 

He mused, 
" Life is good : but not life in itself. Life eternal, eternally young. 
That were life to be lived, or desired ! Well it were if a man could prolong 
The manhood that moves in the muscles, the rapture that mounts in the 

brain 
When life at the prime, in the pastime of living, led on by the train 
Of the jubilant senses, exulting goes forth, brave of body and spirit, 
To conquer, choose, claim, and enjoy what 'twas born to achieve or inherit. 
The dance, and the festal procession ! the pride iu the strenuous play 
Of the sinews that, pliant of power, the will, though it wanton, obey ! 
When the veins are yet wishful, and in them the "bountiful impulses beat, 
When the lilies of Love are yet living, the roses of Beauty yet sweet : 
And the eye glows with glances that kindle, the lip breathes the warmth 

that inspires. 
And the hand hath yet vigor to seize the good thing wliicli the spirit desires I 
O well for the foot that bounds forM'ard I and ever the wind it awakes 
Lifts no lock from the forehead yet white, not a leaf that is withered yet 

shakes 
From the loose crown that laughs on young tresses ! and ever the earth and 

the skies 
Are crammed witli audacious contingencies, measureless means of surprise ! 
Life is sweet to the yoimg that yet know not what life is. But life, after 

Youth, 
The gay liar, leaves hold of the bauble, and Age, with his terrible truth, 
Picks it up, and perceives it is broken, and knows it unfit to engage 
The care it yet craves. . . . Life eternal, eternally wedded to Age ! 
What gain were in that ? Why should any man seek what he loathes to 

prolong ? 
The twilight that darkens the eyeball : the dull ear that's deaf to the song. 
When the maidens rejoice and the bride to the bridegroom, with music, 

is led : 
The palsy that shakes 'neath the blossoms that fall from the chill bridal bed. 
When the hand saith ^ I did,'' not ' I loill do,' the heart saith 'It was,' not 

' 'Twill be,' * 

Too late in man's life is Forever, — too late comes this apple to me !" 
Then the King rose. And lo, it was evening. And leaning, because he 

was old. 
On the sceptre that, curiously sculptiu*ed in ivory garnished with gold. 
To others a rod of dominion, to him was a staff for support, 
!Slow paced he the murmurous pathways where myrtles, in court up to court, 
Mixt with roses in garden on garden, were ranged around fountains that fed 



THE APPLE OF LIFE. 165 

With cool music green odorous twilights : and so, nerver lifting his head 
To look up from the way he walked wearily, he to the House of his Pride 
Eeascended, and entered. 

In cluster, high lamps, spices, odors, each side. 
Burning inward and onward, from cinnamon ceilings, down distances vast 
Of voluptuous vistas, illumined deep halls through whose silentness passed 
King Solomon sighing ; where columns colossal stood, gathered in groves 
As the trees of the forest in Libaims, — there where the wind, as it moves, 
AVhispers, " I, too, am Solomon's servant ! " — huge trunks hid in garlands 

of gold, 
On whose tops the skilled sculptors of Sidon had granted men's gaze to 

behold 
How the phoenix that sits on the cedar's lone summit 'mid fragrance and fire, 
Ever dying, and living, hath loaded with splendors her funeral pyre ; 
How the stork builds her nest on the pine-top ; the date from Uie palm- 
branch depends ; 
And the aloe's great blossom bursts, crowning with beauty the life that it 
ends. [eyed, 

And from hall on to hall, in the doors, mute, magnificent slaves, watchful- 
Bowed to earth as King Solomon passed them. And, passing. King Solo- 
mon sighed. 
And, from hall on to hall pacing feebly, the king mused . . . " O fair Shula- 

mite ! 
Thy beauty is brighter than starlight on Hebron when Hebron is bright. 
Thy sweetness is sweeter than Carmel. The King rules the nations ; but 

tliou. 
Thou rulest the King, my Beloved." 

So murmured King Solomon low 
To himself, as he passed through the portal of porphyry, that dripped, as 

he passed 
From the myrrh-sprinkled wreaths on the locks and the lintels ; and en- 
tered at last. 
Still sighing, the sweet cedarn chamber, contrived for repose and delight. 
Where the beautiful Shulamite slumbered. And straightway, to left and 

to right. 
Bowing down as he entered, the Spirits in bondage to Solomon, there • 
Keeping watch o'er his love, sank their swords, spread their wings, and 

evanished in air. 
The King with a kiss woke the sleeper. And, showing the fruit in his hand, 
'• Behold ! this was brought me erewhile by one coming," he said, "from 

the land 
Tliat lies under the sword of the Cherub. 'Twas pluckt by strange hands 

from the Tree 
Of whose fruit whoso tastes lives forever. And therefore I bring it to thee, 
My Beloved. For thou of the daughters of women are fairest. And lo, 
I, the King, I that love thee, whom men of man's sons have called wisest, 

I know 
That in knowledge is sorrow. Much thought is much care. In the beauty 

of youth, 



t 



1 66 THE APPLE OF LIFE. 



Not the wisdom of age, is enjoyment. Nor spring, is it sweeter, in truth, 
Than winter to roses once withered. The garment, tliough broidered with 

gold. 
Fades apace where the moth frets the fibres. So I, in my glory, grow old. 
And this life maketh mine (save the bliss of my soul in the beauty of thee) 
No sweetness so great now that greatly unsweet 'twere to lose what to me 
Life prolonged, at its utmost, can promise. But thine, O thou spirit of 

bliss, 
Thine is all that the living desire, — youth, beauty, love, joy in all this ! 
And O were it not well for the praise of the woi'ld to maintain evermore 
This mould of a woman, God's master work, made for mankind to adore ? 
Wherefore keep thou the gift I resign. Live forever, rejoicing in life ! 
And of women unborn yet the fairest shall still be King Solomon's wife." 
So he said, and so dropped in her bosom the apple. 

But when he was gone, 
And the beautiful Shulamite, eyeing the gift of the King, sat alone 
With the thoughts the King's words had awakened, as ever she turned and 

perused 
The fruit that, alluring her lip, in her hand lay untasted — she mused, 
" Life is good ; but not life in itself. So is youth, so is beauty. Mere stuff 
Are all these for Love's usance. To live, it is well ; but it is not enough. 
Well, too, to be fair, to be young ; but what good is in beauty and youth 
If the lovely and young are not surer than they that be neither, forsooth, 
Young nor lovely, of being beloved ? O my love, if thou lovest not me, 
Shall I love my own life ? Am I fair, if not fair, Azariah, to thee." 
Then she hid in her bosom the apple. And rose. 

And, reversing the ring 
That, inscribed with the word that works wonders, and signed with the 

seal of the King, 
Compels even spirits to obedience — (for she, for a playthini;, erewhile 
From King Solomon's awful forefinger, had won it away with a smile) — 
The beautiful Shulamite folded her veil o'er her forehead and eyes, 
And unseen from the sweet cedarn chamber, unseen through the long 

galleries. 
Unseen from the palace, she passed, and passed down to the city imseen, 
Unseen passed the green garden wicket, the vineyard, the cypresses green, 
And stood by the doors of the house of the Prince Azariah. And cried. 
In the darkness she cried, — " Azariah, awaken ! ope, ope to me wide ! 
Ope the door, ope the lattice ! Arise ! Let me in, O my love ! It is I. 
I, the bride of King Solomon, love thee. Love, tarry not. Love, shall I 

die ^ 

At thy doors ? I am sick of desire. For my love is more comely than ■ 

gold. 
More precious to me is my love than the throne of a king that is old. 
Behold, I have passed tln-ough the city, unseen of the watchmen. I stand 
By the doors of the house of my love, till my love lead me in by the hand." 
Azariah arose. And unbolted the door to the fair Sliulatnite. 
" O my queen, what dear folly is this, that hath led thee alone, and by 

night, 



THE APPLE OF LIFE. 1 67 

i 

i 

To the bouse of King Solomon's servant ? For lo you, tlie watchmen j 

awake. 
And much for my own, O my queen, must I fear, and much more for thy 

sake. j 

For at til at which is done in the chamber the leek on the house-top shall i 

peep : j 
And the hand of a king it is heavy : the eyes of a king never sleep : 
But the bird of the air beareth news to the king, and the stars of the sky 

Are as soldiers by night on the turrets. I fear, O my queen, lest we die." \ 

" Fear thou not, O my love ! Azariah, fear nothing. For lo, what I \ 

bring ! ■ 
'Tis the fruit of the Tree that in Paradise God hidetli imder the wing 

Of the Cherub that chased away Adam. And whoso this apple doth eat | 

Shall live — live forever ! And since unto ine my own life is less sweet j 

Than tliy love, Azariah, (sweet only my life is if thou lovest me ! ) ' 
Therefore eat ! Live, and love, for life's sake, still, the love that gives 

life unto thee !" , 

Then she held to his lips the life-apple, and kissed him, | 

But soon as alone, ; 

Azariah leaned out from his lattice, he muttered, " 'Tis well ! She is ; 

gone." 
While tbe fruit in his hand lay untasted. "Such visits," he mused, " may , 

cost dear. 
In the love of the great is great danger, much trouble, and care more than : 

cheer." 
Then he laughed and stretched forth his strong arms. For he heard from j 

the streets of the city ! 

The song of the women that sing in the doors after dark their love ditty. '. 
And the clink of the wine-cup, the voice of the wanton, the tripping of 

feet, 
And the laughter of youths running after, allured him. And " Life, it is ; 

sweet i 

While it lasts,'^ sang the women, " and sweeter the good rninute, in that 

it (joes. 
For who, if the rose bloomed forever, so greatly would care for the rose ? 
Wherefore haste! plnck the time in the blossom.'' The prince mused, 

" The counsel is well." 
And the fruit to his lips he uplifted : yet paused. " Who is he that can 

tell 
What his days shall bring forth ? .Life forever . . . But what sort of life ? 

Ah, the doubt ! " 
'Neath his cloak then he thrust back the apple. And opened the door and 

passed out 
To the bouse of the harlot Egyptian. And mused, as he went, "Life is 

good : 
But not life in itself. It is well while the wine-cup is hot in the blood. 
And a man goeth whither he listeth, and doeth tbe thing that he will. 
And liveth his life as he lusteth, and taketh in freedom bis fill 
Of the pleasure that pleaseth bis humor, and feareth no snare by the way. 
Shall I care to be loved by a queen, if my pride with my freedom 1 pay ? 



1 68 THE APPLE OF LIFE. 



Better far is a handful in quiet than botli hands, though filled to o'erflow 

With pride, in vexation of sijirit. And sweeter the roses that blow 

From the wild seeds the wind, where he wanders, with heedless benefi- 
cence tlings, 

Than those that are guarded by dragons to biighten the gardens of kings. 

Let a man take his chance, and be happy. The hart by the hunter pur- 
sued, 

Tliat far from the herd on the hill-top bounds swift through the blue 
solitude, 

Is more to be envied, though Death with his dart follow fast to destroy, 

Than tiie tame beast that, pent in the paddock, tastes neither the danger 
nor joy 

Of the movmtain, and all its surprises. The main thing is, not to live 
long, 

But to live. Better moments of rapture soon ended than ages of wrong. 

Life's feast is best spiced by the Havor of death in it. Just the one chance 

To lose it to-morrow the life that a man lives to-day doth enhance. 

The may-be for me, not the must-be ! Best flourish while flourish the 
flowers, 

And fall ere the frost falls. The dead, do they rest or arise with new 
powers ? 

Either way, well for them. Mine, meanwhile, be the cup of life's fulness 
to-night. 

And to-morrow . . . Well, time to consider" (he felt at the fruit). 
"What delight 

Of his birthright had Esau, when hungry ? To-day with its pottage is 
sweet. 

For a man cannot feed and be full on the faith of to-morrow's baked 
meat. 

Open ! open, my dark-eyed beguiler of darkness. 

Up rose to his knock, 
Light of foot, the lascivious Egyptian, and lifted the latch from the lock, 
And opened. And led in the prince to her chambei', and shook out her 

hair, 
Dark, heavy, and hiunid with odors ; her bosom beneath it laid bare. 
And sleek sallow shoulder ; and sloped back her face, as, when falls the 

slant South 
In wet whispers of rain, flowers bend back to catch it ; so she, with shut 

mouth 
Half-unfolded for kisses ; and sank, as they fell, 'twixt his knees, with a 

laugh, 
On the floor, in a flood of deep hair flung behind her full throat ; held him 

half [lay, 

Aloof with one large, languid arm, while the other uppropped, where she 
Limbs flowing in fulness and lucid in surface as Avaters at play, 
Though in firmness as slippery marble. Anon she sprang loose from, his 

clasp, 
And whirled from the table a flagon of silver twioed round by an asp 
That glittered, — rough gold and red rubies ; and poured him, and praised 

him, the wine 



THE APPLE OF LIFE. 169 



Wherewith she first brightened the moist lip that murmured, " Ha, fool ! 

art thou mine ? 
I am thine. This will last for an hour." Then, liumming strange words 

of a song, 
Sung by maidens in Memphis the old, when they bore the Crowned Image 

along. 
Apples yellow and red from a basket with vine-leaves o'erlaid she 'gan take, 
And played with, peeled, tost them, and caught them, and bit them, for 

idleness' sake ; 
But the rinds on the floor she flung from her, and laughed at the figures 

they made, 
As her foot pusht them this way and that way together. And "Look, 

fool," she said, 
"It is all sour fruit, this ! But those I fling from me, — see here by the 

stain ! — 
Shall carry the mark of my teeth in tlieir flesh. Could they feel but the 

pain, 
O my soul, how these teeth should go tlirough them ! Fool, fool, what 

good gift dost thou bring ? 
For thee have I sweetened with cassia my chambers." " A gift for a king," 
Azariah laughed lotid ; and tost to her the apple. " This comes from the 

Tree 
Of whose fruit whoso tastes lives forever. I care not. I give it to thee. 
Nay, M'itch ! 'tis worth more than the shekels of gold thou hast charmed 

from my purse. 
Take it. Eat, and thank me for the meal, witch ! for Eve, thy sly mother, 

fared worse, 
O thou white-toothe'd taster of apples ? " " Thou liest, fool !" " Taste, 

then, aud try. 
For the truth of the fruit's in the eating. 'Tis tliou art tlie serpent, not I." 
And the strong man laughed loud as he pushed at her lip the life-apple. 

She cauglit 
And held it away from her, musing ; and muttered ... "Go to ! It is 

naught. 
Fool, why dost thou laugh?" And he answered, "Because, witch, it 

tickles my brain 
Intensely to think that all we, that be Something while yet we remain. 
We, the princes of people, — ay, even the King's self, — shall die in our day, 
And thou, that art Nothing, shalt sit on our graves, with oiu* grandsons, 

and play." 
So he said, and laughed louder. 

But when, in the gray of the dawn, he was gone, 
And the wan light waxed large in the window, as she on her bed sat 

alone, 
With the fruit that, alluring her lip, in hor hand lay imtasted, perusing, 
Perplext, the gay gift of the Prince, the dark woman thereat fell a musing, 
And she thovight ..." What is Life without Honor? And what can the 

life that I live 
<iive to me, I shall care to continue, not caring for aught it can give ? 
I. despising the fools that despise me, — a plaything not pleasing myself, — 
Whose life, for the pelf that maintains it, must sell what is paid not by 

pelf ! 



lyo THE APPLE OF LIFE. 



I ? . . . the man called me Nothing. He said well. * The great in flieif 

glory must go.' 
And AVhy should I linger, whose life leadeth nowhere ? — a life which I 

know 
To name is to shame — struck, unsexed, by the world from its list of the 

lives 
Of the women whose womanhood, saved, gets them leave to be mothers 

and wives. 
And the fancies of men change. And bitterly bought is the bread that I 

eat ; 
For, though purchased with body and spirit, Avhen purchased 'tis yet all 

. unsweet." 
Her tears fell : they fell on the apple. She sighed ..." Sour fruit, like 

the rest ! 
Let it go Avith the salt tears upon it. Yet life ... it were sweet if pos- 
sessed 
In tlie power thereof, and the beauty. * A gift for a king ' . . . did he 

say ? 
Ay, a king's life is a life as it sliould be, — a life like the light of the day, 
Wherein all that liveth rejoiceth. For is not the King n-s the sun 
That shineth in heaven and seenieth both heaven and itself all in one ? 
Then to whom may this fruit, the life-giver, be worthily given ? Not me. 
Nor the fool Azariah that sold it for folly. The King ! only he, — 
Only he hath the life that's worth living forever. Whose life, not alone 
Is the life of the King, but the life of the many made mighty in one. 
To the King will I carry this apple. And he (for the hand of a king 
Is a fountain of hope) in his liandmaid shall honor the gift that I bring. 
And men for this deed shall esteem me, with liahab by Israel praised. 
As first among those who, though lowly, their shame into lienor havo 

raised : 
Such honor as lasts when life goes, and, while life lasts, shall lift it above 
What, if loved by the many I loathe, must be loathed by the few I con Id 

love." 

So she rose, and went forth through the city. And with her the apple she 

bore 
In her bosom : and stood 'mid the multitude, waiting therewith in tho 

door 
Of the hall where the King, to give judgment, ascended at morning his 

throne : 
And, kneeling there, cried, "Let the King live forever! Behold, I am 

one 
Whom the vile of themselves count the vilest. But great is the grace of my 

lord. 
And now let my lord on his handmaid look down, and give ear to her 

word." 
Thereat, in tlie witness of all, she drew forth, and (uplifting her head) 
Showed the Apple of Life, which who tastes, tastes not death. " And this 

apple," she said, 
"Last night was delivered to me, that thy servant should eat, and not die. 
But I said to the soul of thy servant, ' Not so. For behold, what am I ? 




'And, kneeling there cried, 'Let the king live forever! 



THE APPLE OF LIFE. 17 1 



That the King, in his glory and gladness, should cease from the light of tho 

sun, 
Whiles I, that am least of his slaves, in my shame and abasement live on.' 
For not sweet is the life of thy servant, unless to thy servant my lord 
Stretch his hand, and show favor. For surely the frown of a Icing is a 

sword. 
But the smile of the King is as honey that flows from the clefs of the 

rock, 
And his grace is as dew that from Horeb descends on the heads of the 

flock : 
In the King is the heart of a host : the King's strength is an army of men : 
And the wrath of the King is a Hon that roareth by night from his den : 
But as grapes from the vines of En-Gedi are favors that fall from his 

hands. 
And as towers on the hill-tops of Shenir the throne of King Solomon 

stands. 
And for this, it were well that forever the King, who is many in one. 
Should sit, to be seen through all time, on a throne 'twixt the moon and 

the sun ! 
For how shall one lose what he hath not ? Who hath, let him keep what 

he hath. 
Wherefore I to the King give this apple." 

Then great was King Solomon's wrath. 
And he rose, rent his garment, and cried, '"'Woman, whence came this 

apple to thee?" 
But when lie was 'ware of the truth, then his heart was awakened. And he 
Knew at once that the man who, erewhile, unawared coming to him, had 

brought 
That Apple of Life was, indeed, God's good Angel of Death. And he 

thought 
" In mercy, I doubt not, when man's eyes were opened, and made to see 

plain 
All the wrong in himself, and the wretchedness, God sent to close them 

again 
For man's sake, his last friend upon earth — Death, the servant of God, who 

is just. 
liCt man's spirit to Him whence it cometh return, and his dust to the 

dust ! " 

Then the Apple of Life did King Solomon seal in an urn that was signed 
With the seal of Oblivion ,: and summoned the Spirits that walk in the 

wind 
Unseen on the summits of mountains, where never the eagle yet flew ; 
And these he commanded to bear far away, — out of reach, out of view. 
Out of hope, out of memory, — higher than Ararat buildcth his throne. 
In the Urn of Oblivion the Apple of Life. 

But on green jasper-stone 
Did the King write the story thereof for instruction. And Enoch, the seer, 
Coming afterward, searched out the meaning. And he that hath ears, let 
him hear, 



THE WANDERER. 



DEDICATION. 
To J. F. 



As, in the laiu-el's munnurous leaves 
'Twas fabled, once, a Virgin dwelt; 
Within the poet's page yet heaves 
The poet's Heart, and loves or grieves 
Or triumphs, as it felt. 

A human spirit here records 

The annals of its hmnan strife. 
A human hand hath touched these 

chords. 
These songs may all be idle words : 
And yet — they once were life. 

I gave my harp to Memory. 
She sung of hope, when hope was 
young, 
Of youth, as youth no more may be ; 
And, since she sung of youth, to 
thee. 
Friend of my youth, she sung. 

For all youth seeks, all manhood 
needs. 
All youth and manhood rarely 
lind : 
A strength more strong than codes 

or creeds. 
In lofty thoughts and lovely deeds 
Revealed to heart and mind ; 

A staff to stay, a star to guide ; 

A spell to soothe, a power to raise ; 
A faith by fortune firmly tried ; 
A judgment resolute to preside 
O'er days at strife with days. 

(172) 



O large in lore, in nature sound 1 
O man to me, of all men, dear ! 
All these in thine my life hath found, 
And force to tread the rugged ground 
Of daily toil, Avith cheer. 

Accept — not these, the broken cries 

Of days receding far from me — 
But all the love that in them lies, 
The man's heart in the melodies, 
The man's heart honoring thee ! 

Sighing I sung ; for some sublime 
Emotion made my music jar : 
The forehead of this restless time 
Pales in a fervid, passionate clime, 
Lit by a changeful star ; 

And o'er the Age's threshold, traced 

In characters of hectic fire. 
The name of that keen, fervent-faced 
And toiling serajJi, hath been placed, 
AVhich men have called Desire. 

But thou art strong where, even of 
old. 
The old heroic strength was rare. 
In high emotions self-controlled. 
And insight keen, but never cold, 
To lay all falsehood bare ; 

Despising all those glittering lies 
Which in these days can fool man- 
kind ; 
But full of noble sympathies 
For what is genuinely wise, 
And beautiful, and kind. 



THE WANDERER. 



173 



And thou ^^■ilt pardon all the much 
Of weakness which doth here 
abound, 
Till music, little prized as such, 
With thee find worth from one true 
touch 
Of nature in its sound. 

Though mighty spirits are no more, 
Yet spirits of beauty still remain. 
Gone is the Seer tliat, by the shore 
Of lakes as limpid as his lore, 
Lived to one ceaseless strain 

And strenuous melody of mind. 
But one there rests that hath the 
• power [bind 

To charm the midnight moon, and 
All spirits of the sweet south-wind, 
And steal from every shower 

That sweeps green England cool and 
clear, 
The violet of tender song. 
Great Alfred ! long may England's 

ear 
His music fill, his name be dear 
To English bosoms long ! 

And one ... in sacred silence 
slieathed 
That name I keep, my verse would 
shame. 
The name my lips in prayer first 

breathed 
Was his : and prayer hath yet be- 
queathed 
Its silence to that name ; — 

Which yet an age remote shall hear, 
Borne on the fourfold wind sub- 
lime 
By Fame, where, with some faded 

year 
These songs shall sink, like leaflets 
sere, 
In avenues of Time. 

Love on my harp his finger lays ; 
His lumd is held against the 
chords. 
My heart upon the music weighs. 
And, beating, hushes foolish praise 
From desultory words : 



And Childhood steals, with wistful 
grace, 
'Twixt him and me ; an infant 
hand [chase 

Chides gently back the thoughts that 
The forward hour, and turns my 
face 
To that remembered land 

Of legend, and the Summer sky, 

And all the wild Welsh waterfalls. 
And haunts where he, and thou, 

and I 
Once wandered with the wandering 
Wye, 
And scaled the airy walls 

Of Chepstow, from whose ancient 

height 

We watched the liberal sun go 

down ; [night. 

Then onward, through the gradual 

Till, ere the moon was fully bright, 

We supped in Monmouth Tow.n 

And though, dear friend, thy love 

retains 

The choicest sons of song in fee, 

To thee not less I pour these strains, 

Knowing that in thy heart remains 

A little place for me. 

Nor wilt thou all forget the time 
Though it be past, in which to- 
gether. 
On many an eve, with many a rhyme 
Of old and modern bards sublime 
We soothed the summer weather : 

And, citing all he said or sung 
With praise reserved for bards like 
him. 
Spake of that friend who dwells 

among 
The Apennine, and there hath strung 
A harp of Anakim ; 

Than whom a mightier mas ternever 
Touched the deep chords of hid- 
den things ; 
Nor error did from truth dissever 
With keener glance ; nor made en- 
deavor 
To rise on bolder wings 



L 



174 



THE WANDERER. 



lu those high regions of the soul 
Where tliouglit itself grows dim 
with awe. 
But now the star of eve hath stole 
Through the deep sunset, and the 
whole 
Of heaven begins to draw 
Florence, September 24, 1857. 



The darkness round me, and the 
dew. 
And my pale Muse doth fold her 
eyes. 
Adieu, my friend ; my guide, adieu! 
May never night, 'twixt me and you, 
With thoughts less fond arise 1 
THE AUTHOR. 



PROLOGUE 



PART I. 



Sweet are the rosy memories of the 
lips, 
That first kissed ours, albeit they 
kiss no more : 
Sweet is the sight of sunset-sailing 
ships, 
Although they leave us on a lonely 
shore : 
Sweet are familiar songs, though 
Music dips 
Her lioUow shell in Thought's for- 

lornest wells : 
And sweet, though sad, the sound 
of midnight bells. 
When the oped casement with the 
night-rain drips. 

There is a pleasure which is born of 
pain : 
The grave of all things hath its 
violet. 
Else why, through days which never 
come again, 
Roams Hope with that strange 
longing, like Regret ? 
Why put the posy in the cold dead 
hand ? 
Why plant the rose above the 

lonely grave ? 
Why bring the corpse across the 
salt sea-wave ? 
Why deem the dead more near in 
native land ? life 

Thy name hath been a silence in my 
So long, it falters upon language 
now. 



more to me than sister or than 

wife 
Once . . . and now — nothing ! It 

is hard to know 
That such things liave been, and are 

not, and yet 
Life loiters, keeps a pulse at even 

measure, 
And goes upon its business and its 

pleasiu'e. 
And knows not all the depths of its 

regret. 

Thou art not in thy picture, O my 
friend ! 
The years are sad and many since 
I saw thee. 
And seem with me to have survived 
their end. 
Fai' otherwise than thus did mem- 
ory draw thee 

1 ne'er shall know thee other than 

thou wast. 
Yet save, indeed, the same sad 

eyes of old. 
And that abundant hair's warm 

silken gold. 
Thou art changed, if this be like the 

look thou hast. 

Changed ! There the epitaph of all 
the years 
Was sounded ! I am changed too. 
Let it be. 
Yet it is sad to know my latest tears 
Were faithful to a memory, — not 
to thee. 



THE WANDERER. 



175 



Nothing is left us ! nothing — save 
the soul. 
Yet even the immortal in us alters 

too. 
Who is it his old sensations can 
renew ? 
Slowly the seas are changed. Slow 
ages roll 

The mountains to a level. Nature 
sleeps, 
And dreams her dream, and to 
new work awakes 
After a hundred years are in the 
deeps. 
But Man is changed before a 
wrinkle breaks 
The brow's sereneness, or the curls 
are gray. 
We stand within the flux of sense : 

the near 
And far change place : and we see 
\ nothing clear. 
That's false tomorrow which was 
true to-day. 

All, could the memory cast her spots, 
as do 
The snake's brood theirs in spring! 
and be once more 
Wholly renewed, to dwell i' the time 
that's new, 
With no reiterance of those pangs 
of yore. 
Peace, peace ! My wild song will go 
wandering 
Too M'antonly, down paths a pri- 
vate pain 
Hath trodden bare. What was it 
jarred the strain ? 
Some crusht illusion, left with crum- 
pled wing 

Tangled in Music's web of twined 
strings — 
That started that false note, and 
cracked the tune 
In its beginning. Ah, forgotten 
things 
Stumble back strangely ! And the 
ghost of June 



Stands by December's fire, cold, cold! 
and puts 
The last spark out. 

How could I sing aright 
With those old airs haunting me all 

the night 
And those old steps that sound when 
daylight shuts ? 

For back she comes, and moves re- 
proachfully, 
The mistress of my moods, and 
looks bereft 
(Cruel to the last !) as though 'twere 
I, not she. 
That did the wrong, and broke the 
spell, and left 
Memoi-y comfortless. 

Away ! away ! 
Phantoms, about whose brows the 

bindweed clings. 
Hopeless regret ! 

In thinking of these things 
Some men have lost their minds, 
and others may. 

Yet, O, for one deep draught in this 
dull houi: ! 
One deep, deep draught of the de- 
parted tim6 ; 
O, for one brief strong pulse of an- 
cient power. 
To beat and breathe through all 
-the valves of rhyme ! 
Thou, Memory, with the downward 
eyes, that art 
The cupbearer of gods, pour deep 

and long. 
Brim all the vacant chalices of 
song 
With health ! Droop down thine 
urn. 

I hold my heart. 
One draught of what I shall not 
taste again, 
Save when my brain with thy dark 
wine is brimmed, — 
One draught ! and then straight on- 
ward, spite of pain, 
And spite of all things changed, 
with gaze undimmed, 



176 



THE WANDERER. 



Love's footsteps tlirougli the waning 
Past to explore 
Undaunted ; and to carve, in the 

wan light 
Of Hope's last outposts, on Song's 
utmost height 
The sad resemblance of an hour no 
more. 

Midnight, and love, and youth, and 
Italy ! 
Love in the land where love most 
lovely seems ! 
Land of my love, though I be far 
from thee. 
Lend, for love's sake, the light of 
thy moonbeams, 
The spirit of thy cypress-groves, and 
all 
Thy dark-eyed beauty, for a little 

while 
To my desire. Yet once more let 
her smile 
Fall o'er me : o'er me let her long 
hair fall. 

The lady of my life, whose lovely 
eyes 
Dreaming, or waking, lure me. I 
shall know her 
By Love's own planet o'er her in the 
skies. 
And Beauty's blossom in the grass 
below her ! 
Dreaming, or waking, in her soft, 
sad gaze 
Let my heart bathe, as on that 

fated night 
I saw her, when my life took in 
the sight 
Of her sweet face for all its nights 
and days. 

Her winsome head was bare : and 
she had twined 
Through its rich curls wild red 
anemones ; 
One stream of her soft hair strayed 
unconfined 
Down her ripe cheek, and shad- 
owed her deep eyes. 



The bunch of sword-grass fell from 
her loose hand. 
Her modest foot beneath its snowy 

skirt 
Peeped, and the golden daisy was 
not hurt. 
Stately, yet slight, she stood, as fair- 
ies stand. 

Under the blesse'd darkness unrc- 
proved 
We were alone, in that blest hour 
of time. 
Which first revealed to us how much 
we loved, 
'Neath the thick starlight. The 
young night sublime 
Hung trembliiig o'er us. At her 
feet I knelt, 
And gazed up from her feet into 

her eyes. 
Her face was bowed : we breathed 
each othei-'s sighs : 
We did not speak : not move : wc 
looked : we felt. 

The night said not a word. The 
breeze was dead. 
The leaf lay without whispering 
on the tree. 
As I lay at her feet. Droopt was her 
head : 
One hand in mine : and one still 
pensively 
Went wandering through my hair 
\\<i were together. 
How? Where? What matter? 

Somewhere in a dream. 
Drifting, slow di'iftiug, down a 
Avizard stream : 
Whither ? Together : then what 
matter whither ? 

It was enough for me to clasp lier 
hand : 
To blend with her love-looks my 
own : no more. 
Enough (with thoughts like ships 
that cannot land. 
Blown by faint wiuds about a 
magic shore) 



THk WANDEREk. 



^11 



To realize, in each mysterious feel- 
ing, 
The di'oop of the warm cheek so 

near my own : 
The cool white arm about my 
shoulder thrown : 
Those exquisite frail feet, where I 
was kneeling. 

How little know they life's divinest 
bliss, 
That know not to possess and yet 
refrain ! 
Let the young Psyche roam, a fleet- 
ing kiss : — 
Grasp it — a few poor grains of dust 
remain. 
See how those floating flowers, the 
butterflies, 
Hover the garden through, and 

take no root ! 
Desire forever hath a flying foot. 
Free pleasure comes and goes be- 
neath the skies. 

Close not thy hand upon the inno- 
cent joy 
That trusts itself within thy reach. 
It may. 
Or may not, linger. Thou canst but 
destroy 
The winged wanderer. Let it go 
or stay. 
Love thou the rose, yet leave it on 
its stem. 
Think ! Midas starved by turning 

all to gold. 
Blesse'd ai'e those that spare, and 
that withhold. 
Because the whole world shall be 
trusted then. 

The foolish Faun pursues the imwil- 
ling Nymph 
That culls her flowers beside the 
precipice, 
Or dips her shining ankles in the 
lymph : 
But, just when she must perish or 
be his, 
Heaven puts an arm out. She is 
safe. The shore 
12 



Gains some new fountain ; or the 

lilied lawn 
A rarer sort of rose : but, ah, poor 

Faun ! 
To thee she sliall be changed for- 

evermore. 

Chase not too close the fading rap- 
ture. Leave [seen. 
To Love his long auroras, slowly 
Be ready to release, as to receive. 
Deem those the nearest, soul to 
soul, between 
Whose lips yet lingers reverence on 
a sigh. 
Judge what thy sense can reach 

not, most thine own. 
If once thy soul hath seized it. 
The luiknowu 
Is life to love, religion, poetry. 

The moon had set. There was not 
any light, 
Save of the lonely legioned watch- 
stars pale [bright 
In outer air, and what by fits made 

Hot oleanders in a rosy vale 
Searched by the lamping fly, whose 
little spark 
Went in and out, like passion's 

bashful hope. 
Meanwhile the sleepy globe began 
to slope 
A ponderous shoulder sunward 
through the dark. 

And the night passed in beauty like 
a dream. 
Aloof in these dark heavens paus- 
ed Destiny, 
With her last star descending in the 
gleam 
Of the cold morrow, from the 
emptied sky. 
The hour, the distance from her old 
self, all 
The novelty and loneness of the 

place, 
Had left a lovely awe on that fair 
face, 
And all the land grew strange and 
magical. 



178 



THE WANDERER. 



As droops some billowing cloud to 
the crouched hill, 
Heavy with all heaven's tears, for 
all earth's care, 
She drooped unto me, without force 
or will, 
And sank upon my bosom, mur- 
muring there, 
A woman's inarticulate, passionate 
words. [earth ! 

O moment of all moments upon 
O life's supreme ! How worth, 
how wildly worth. 
Whole worlds of flame, to know this 
world affords 

What even Eternity cannot restore ! 
When all the ends of life take 
hands, and meet 
Bound centres of sweet fire. Ah, 
never more, 
Ah never, shall the bitter with the 
sweet 
Be mingled so in the pale after- 
years ! 
One hour of life immortal spirits 

possess. 
This drains the world, and leaves 
but weariness. 
And parching passion, and perplex- 
ing tears. 

Sad is it, that we cannot even keep 
That hour to sweeten life's last 
toil : but Youth 
Grasps all, and leaves us : and, when 
we M'ould weep. 
We dare not let oxir tears flow 
lest, in truth, 
They fall upon our work which must 
be done. 
And so we bind up our torn hearts 

from breaking : 
Our eyes from weeping, and our 
brows from aching : 
And follow the long pathway all 
alone. 

O moment of sweet peril, perilous 
sweet ! 
When woman joins herself to man ; 
and man 



Assumes the full-lived woman, to 
complete 
The end of life, since human life 
began ! 
When in the perfect bliss of union, 
Body and soul triumphal rapture 

claim, 
When there's a spirit in blood, in 
spirit a flame. 
And earth's lone hemispheres glow, 
fused in one ! 

Hare moment of rare peril ! . . . The 
bard's song. 
The mystic's musing fancy. Did 
there ever 
Two perfect souls, in perfect forms, 
belong 
Perfectly to each other ? Never, 
never ! 
Perilous were such moments, for a 
touch 
Might mar their clear perfection. 

Exquisite 
Even for the peril of their frail de- 
light. 
Such things man feigns : such seeks: 
but finds not such. 

No ! for 'tis in ourselves our love 
doth grow : 
And, when our love is fully risen 
witliin us. 
Round the first object doth it over- 
flow, 
Wliich, be it fair or foul, is sure to 
win us 
Out of ourselves. We clothe with 
our own nature 
The man or woman its first want 

doth find. 
The leafless prop with our own 
buds we bind, 
And hide in blossoms : fill the empty 
feature 

With our own meanings : even prize 

defects 
Which keep the mark of our own 

choice upon 
The chosen : bless each fault whose 

spot protects 



THE WANDERER. 



179 



Our clioice from possible confu- 
sion 
With the world's other creatures : 
we believe them 

What most we wish, the more we 
find they are not : 

Our choice ouce made, with our 
own choice we war not : 
We worship them for what ourselves 
we give them. 

Doubt is this otherwise. . . . When 
fate removes 
The unworthy one from our re- 
luctant arms. 
We die with that lost love to other 
loves, 
Ami turn to its defects from other 
charms. 
And nobler forms, where moved 
those forms, may move 
With lingering looks : our cold 

farewells we wave them. 
We loved our lost loves for the 
love we gave them, 
And not for anything they gave our 
love. 

Old things return not as they were 
in Time. 
Trust nothing to the recompense 
of Chance, 
Which deals with novel forms. This 
falling rhyme 
Fails from the flowery steeps of 
(jld romance, 
Down that abyss which Memory 
droops above. 
And, gazing out of hopelessness 

down there, 
I see the shadow creep through 
Toutlvs gold. hair 
And white Death watching over red- 
lipped Love. 

PART II. 

The soul lives on. What lives on 
with the soul ? 
Glimpses of something better than 
her best ; 



Truer than her truest : motion to a 
pole 
Beyond the zones of this orb's diin- 
ness guest : 
And (since life dies not with the first 
dead bliss) 
Blind notions of some meaning 

moved through time, 
Some purpose in the deeps of the 
sublime. 
That stirs a pulse here, could we find 
out this. 

Visions and noises rouse us. I dis- 
cern 
Even in change some comfort, O 
Beloved ! 
Sims rise and set ; stars vanish and 
return ; 
But never quite the same. And 
life is moved 
Toward new experience. Every eve 
and morn 
Descends and springs with increase 

on the world. 
And what is death but life in this 
life furled ? 
The outward cracks, the inward life 
is born. 

Friejids pass beyond the borders of 
this Known, 
And draw our thoughts up after, 
them. We say 
" They are : but their relations now 
are done 
With Natm-e, and the plan of night 
and day." 
If never mortal man from this world's 
light 
Did pass away to that surrounding 

gloom, 
'Twere well to doubt the life be- 
yond the tomb ; 
But now is Truth's dark side revealed 
to sight. 

Father of spirits ! Thine all secrets 
be. 
I bless Thee for the light Thoa 
hast revealed, 



THE WANDERER. 



And that Thou hidest. Part of me 
I see, 
And part of me Thy wisdom hath 
concealed, 
Till the new life divulge it. Lord, 
imbue me 
With will to work in this diurnal 

spliere, 
Knowing myself my life's day-la- 
borer here, 
Where evening brings the day's 
work's wages to me. 

I work my work. All its results are 
Thine. 
I know the loyal deed becomes a 
fact 
Which Thou wilt deal with : nor will 
I repine 
Although I miss the value of the 
act. 
Thou carest for the creatures : and 
the end 
Thou seest. The world unto Thy 

hands I leave : 
And to Thy hands my life. I will 
not grieve 
Because I know not all Thou dost in- 
tend. 

Something I know. Oft, shall it 

come about 
• When every heart is full with hope 

for man 
The horizon straight is darkened, 

and a doubt 
Clouds all. The work the world 

so well began 
Wastes down, and by some deed of 

shame is hnished. 
Ah yet, I will not be dismayed : 

nor though 
The good caiise flourish fair, and 

Freedom flow 
All round, my watch beyond shall 

be diminished. 

What seemed the triumph of the 
Fiend at length 
Might be the effort of some dying 
Devil, 



Permitted to put forth his fullest 
strength 
To lose it all forever. While, the 
evil 
Whose cloven crest our paeans float 
above 
Might have been less than what 

unnoticed lies 
'Neath our rejoicings. Which of 
us is wise ? 
We know not what we mourn : nor 
why we love. 

But teach me, O Omnipotent, since 
strife. 
Sorrow, and pain are but occur- 
rences 
Of that condition through which 
flows my life. 
Not part of me, the immortal, 
whom distress 
Cannot retain, to vex not thought 
for these : 
But to be patient, bear, forbear, 

restrain, 
And hold my spirit pure above my 
pain. 
No star that looks through life's dark 
lattices, 

But what gives token of a world 
elsewhere. 
I bless Thee for the loss of all 
things here 
Which proves the gaiia to be : the 
hand of Care 
That shades the eyes from earth, 
and beckons near 
The rest which sweetens all : the 
shade Time thnnvs 
On Love's pale countenance, that 

he may gaze 
Across Eternity for better days 
Unblinded ; and the wisdom of all 
woes : 

I bless Thee for the life Thou gavest, 
albeit 
It hath known sorrow : for the sor- 
row's self 

I bless Thee ; and the gift of wings 
to flee it, 



THE WANDERER. 



Led by this spirit of song, — this 
ministering elf, 
That to sweet uses doth unwind my 
pain, 

And spin his palace out of poison- 
flowei's, 

To float, an impidse, through the 
livelong hours. 
From sky to sky, on Fancy's glitter- 
ing skein. 

Aid me, sweet Spirit, escaping from 
the throng 
Of those that raise the Corybantic 
shout, 
And barbarous, dissonant cymbal's 
clash prolong, 
In fear lest any hear the God cry 
out, 
Now that the night resumes her 
bleak retreat 
In these dear lands, footing the 

uuwandered waste 
Of Loss, to walk in Italy, and 
taste 
A little while of what was once so 
sweet. 

PART III. 

NuKSE of an ailing world, belove'd 
Night ! 
Our days are fretfid children, weak 
to bear 
A little pain : they wrangle, wound, 
and light 
Each other, weep, and sicken, and 
despair. 
Thou, with thy motherly hand that 
healeth care. 
Stillest our little noise : rebukest 

one, 
Soothest another : blamest tasks 
undone : 
. efreshest jaded hope ; and teachest 
prayer. 

Thine is the mother's sweet hush- 
hush, that stills 
The flutterings of a plaintive heart 
to rest. 



Tlxine is the mother's medicining 
hand tiiat fills 
Sleep's opiate : thine the mother's 
patient breast : 
Thine, too, the mother's mute re- 
l^roachful eyes. 
That gently look our angry noise 

to shame 
When all is done : we dare not 
meet their blame : 
They are so silent, and they are so 
wise. 

Thou that from this lone casement, 
while I write. 
Seen in the shadowy upspring, 
swift dost post 
Without a sound the polar star to 
light, 
Not idly did the Chaldee shepherds 
boast 
By thy stern lights man's life aright 
to read. 
All day he hides himself from his 

own heart, 
Swaggers and struts, and plays his 
foolish part : 
Thou onlyseest him as he is indeed. 

For who could feign false worth, or 
give the nod 
Among his fellows, or this dust 
disown, 
With naught between him and those 
lights of God, 
Left awfully alone with the Alone ? 
Who vaunt high words, whose least 
heart's beating jars 

The hush of sentinel worlds that 

take mute note 
Of all beneath yon judgment 

plains remote ? — 
A universal cognizance of stars I 

And yet, O gentlest angel of the 
Lord ! 
Thou leadest by the hand the 
artisan 
Away from work. Thou bringest, 

on shij)-board, \ 

When gleam the dead-lights, to the i 
lonely man 



l82 



THE WANDERER. 



That turns the wheel, a bless(?d 
memory 
Of apple-blossoms, and the moun- 
tain vales 
About Ills little cottage in Green 
Wales, 
Miles o'er the ridges of the rolling 
sea. 

Thou bearest divine forgiveness 
amongst men. 
Relenting Anger pauses by the bed 
Where Sleep looks so like Death. 
The absent then 
Return ; and Memory beckons 
back the dead, 
Thou helpest home (thy balmy hand 
it is !) 
The hard-worked husband to the 

pale-cheeked wife, 
And hushest up the poor day's 
household strife 
On marriage pillows, with a good- 
night kiss. 

Thou bringest to the wretched and 
forlorn 
Woman, that down the glimmer- 
ing by-street hovers, 
A dream of better days : the gleam 
of corn 
About her father's field, and her 
first lover's 
Grave, long forgotten in the green 
churchyard : 
Voices, long-stilled, from purer 

hours, before 
The rushlight, Hope, went out ; 
and, through tlie door 
Of the lone garret, when the nights 
were hard, 

Hunger, the wolf, put in his paw, 
and found her 
Sewing the winding-sheet of 
Youth, alone ; 

Ajid griped away the last cold com- 
forts round her : — 
Her little bed ; the mean clothes 
she had on : 

Her mother's picture — the sole saint 
the knew : 



Till nothing else was left for the 

last crust 
But the poor body, and the heart's 

young trust 
In its own courage : and so these 

went too. 

Home from the heated Ball flusht 
Beauty stands, 
I\[;ising beside her costly couch 
alone : 
But while she loosens, faint, with 
jewelled hands. 
The diamonds from her dark hair, 
one by one. 
Thou whisperest in her empty heart 
the name 
Of one that died heart-broken for 

her sake 
Long since, and all at once the 
coiled hell-snake 
Turns stinging in his egg, — and 
pomp is shame. 

Thou comest to the man of many 
pleasures 
Without a joy, that, soulless, plays 
for souls, 
Whose life's a squandered heap of 
plundered treasures. 
While, listless loitering by, the 
moment rolls 
From nothing on to nothing. From 
the shelf 
Perchance he takes a cynic book. 

Perchance 
A dead flower stains the leaves. V 
Tlie old romance \ 

Returns. Ere morn, perchance, he 
shoots himself. 

Thou comest, with a touch of scorn, 

to me, 
That o'er the broken wine-cup of 

my youtli 
Sit brooding here, and poiutest 

silently 
To thine unchanging stars. Yes I 

yes ! in truth. 
They seem more reachless now than 

when of yore 



THE WANDERER. 



^^3 



Above the promist land I watcht 
them shine, 

And all among their cryptic ser- 
pentine 
Went climbing Hope, new planets to 
explore. 

Not for the flesh that fades — al- 
though decay 
This thronged metropolis of sense 
o'erspread: 
Not for the joys of youth, that fleet 
away 
When the wise swallows to the 
south are fled ; 
Not that, beneath the law which 
fades the flower, 
An earthly hope should wither in 

the cells 
Of this poor earthly house of life, 
where dwells 
Unseen the solitaiy Thinking- 
Power ; 

But that where fades the flower the 
weed sliould flourish ; 
For all the baflled efforts to achieve 
The imperishable from the things 
that perish. 
For broken vows, and weakened 
will, I grieve. 
Knowing that night of all is creeping 
on 
Wherein can no man work, I 

sorrow most 
For what is gained, and not for 
what is lost ; 
Nor mourn- alone what's undone, 
but what's done. 

What light, from yonder windless 
cloud released, 
Is widening up the peaks of yon 
black hills ? 
It is the full moon in the mystic 
east. 
Whose coming half the the im- 
ravisht darkness fills 
Till all among the ribbed light 
cloudlets pale, 
From shore to shore in sapphrine 
deeps divine, 



The orbed splendor seems to slide 
and shine 
Aslope the roling vapors in the vale. 

Abroad tlie stars' majestic light is 
fl ung, 
And they fade brightening up the 
steps of Night. 
Cold mysteries of the midnight ! 
that, among 
The sleeps and pauses of this 
world, in sight, 
Keveal a doubtful hope to wild De- 
sire ; 
Which, hungering for the sources 

of the suns, 
Makes moan beyond the blue Sep- 
tentrions. 
And spidery Saturn in his webs of 
fire ; 

Whether the unconscious destinies of 
man 
Move with the motions of your 
sphere'd lights, 
And his brief course, foredoomed 
ere he began, 
Your shining symbols fixed in 
reachless heights. 
Or whether' all the purpose of his 
pain 
Be shut in his wild heart and 

feverish will. 
He knows no more than this : — 
that you are still. 
But he is moved : he goes, but you 
remain. 

Fooled was the human vanity that 
wrote 
Strange names in astral fire on 
yonder pole. 
Who and what were they — in what 
age remote — 
That scrawled weak boasts on yon 
sidereal scroll ? 
Orion shines. Now seek for Nim- 
rod. Where ? 
Osiris is a fable, and no more : 
But Sirius burns as brightly as of 
yore. 
There is no shada on Berenice's hair. 



184 



THE WANDERER. 



Tou that outlast the Pyramids, as 
they 
Outlast their founders, tell us of 
our doom ! 
You that see love depart, and Error 
stray, 
And Genius toiling at a splendid 
tomh, 
Like those Egyptian slaves : and 
Hope deceived : 
And strength still failing when the 

goal is near : 
And Passion parcht : and Kapture 
claspt to Fear : 
And Trust betrayed : and Memory 
bereaved ! 



Vain question ! Shall some other 
voice declare 
What my soul knows not of her- 
self? Ah no ! 
Dumb patient Monster, grieving 
everywhere, 
Thou answerest nothing which I 
did not know. 
The broken fragments of ourselves 
we seek 
In alien forms, and leave our lives 

beliind. 
In our own memories om* graves 
we find. * 

And when we lean upon our hearts, 
they break. 

I seem to see 'mid yonder glimmer- 
ing S2:)heres 
Another world : — not that our 
prayers record, 
Wherein our God shall wipe away all 
tears, 
And never voice of mourning shall 
be heard ; 
But one between the sunset and 
moon rise : 
Near night, yet neighboring day : 

a twilit land, 
And peopled by a melancholy 
band — 
The souls that loved and failed — 
with hopeless eyes ; 



More like that Hades of the antique 
creeds ; — 
A land, of vales forlorn, where 
Thought shall roam 
Regretful, void of wholesome human 
deeds, [home, 

An endless, homeless pining after 
To which all sights and sounds shall 
minister 
In vain : — white roses glimmering 

all alone 
In an evening light, and, witli his 
haunting tone, 
The advancing twiliglit's shard-born 
trumpeter. 

A world like this world's worst come 
back again ; 
Still groaning 'neath the burthen 
of a Fall : 
Eternal longing with eternal pain. 
Want without hope, and memory 
saddening all. 
All congregated failure and despair 
Shall wander there, through some 

old maze of wrong : — 
Ophelia drowning in her t'wn 
death-song, 
And First-Love strangled in his 
golden hair. 

Ah well, for those that overcome, no 
doubt 
The crowns are ready ; strength is 
to the strong. 
But we — but we — weak hearts that 
grope about 
In darkness, with a lamp that fails 
along 
The lengthening midnight, dying ere 
we reach 
The bridal doors I O, what for us 

remains. 
But mortal effort with immortal 
pains ? 
And yet— God breathed a spirit into 
each ! 

I laiow this miracle of the soul is 
more 
Than all the marvels that it looks 
J upon. 



IN ITAL V. 



^85 



And we are kings whose lieritage 


So, strong as Atlas, sboiild the 


was before 


spirit stand, 


The spheres, and owes no homage 


And turn the great globe round in 


to the sun. 


her right hand. 


In my own breast a mightier world I 
bear 
Tlian all those orbs on orbs about 


For recreation of her sovereign sway. 




me rolled ; 


Ah yet ! — For all, I shall not use my 


Nor are you kinglier, stars, though 


power, 


throned on gold, 


Xor reign within the light of my 


And given the empires of the mid- 


own home, 


night-air. 


Till speculation fades, and that 




strange hour 


For I, too, am undying as you are. 


Of the departing of the soul is 


teach me calm, and teach me 


come ; 


self-control : — 


Till all this Avrinkled husk of care 


To sphere my spirit like you fixe'd 


falls by. 


star 


And my immortal nature stands 


That moves not ever in the utmost 


upright 


pole. 


In her perpetual morning, and the 


But whirls, and sleeps, aud turns all 


light 


heaven one way. 


Of suns that set not on Eternity ! 



BOOK 1.— IN ITALY 



THE MAGIC LAND. 

By woodland belt, by ocean bar. 
The full south breeze our fore- 
heads fanned, 

And, undei many a yellow star, 
We dropped into the Magic Land. 

There, every sound and every sight 
Means more than sight or soimd 
elsewhere ; 

Each twilight star a twofold light ; 
Each rose a double redness, there. 

By ocean bar, by woodland belt. 
Our silent course a syren led. 

Till dark in dawn began to melt, 
Througli the wild wizard-work 
o'erhead. 

A murmur from the violet vales ! 
A glory in the goblin dell ! 



There Beauty all her breast unveils, 
And Music pours out all her shell. 

We watched, toward the land of 
dreams. 
The fair moon draw the murmur- 
ing main ; 
A single thread of silver beams 
Was made the monster's rippling 
chain. 

We heard far off the syren's song ; 
We caught the gleam of sea-maid's 
hair. [among. 

The glimmering isles and rocks 
We moved through sparkling pur- 
ple air. 

Then Morning rose, and smote from 
far, 

Her elfin harps o'er land and sea ; 
And woodland belt, and ocean bar, 

To one sweet note, sighed " Italy! " 



i86 



IN ITALY. 



DESIRE. 

The golden Planet of the Occident 
Warm from his bath comes up, 
i' the rosy air, 
And you may tell which way the 
Daylight went, 
Only by his last footsteps shining 
there : 
For now he dwells 
Sea-deep o'er the other shore of 
the world. 
And winds himself in the pink- 
mouthed shells ; 
Or, with his dusky, sun-dyed Priest, 
Walks in the gardens of the gorgeous 
East : 
Or hides in Indian hills ; or saileth 
Avhere 
Floats, curiously curled. 
Leagues out of sight and scent of 

spicy trees, 
The cream-white nautilus on sap- 
l^hrine seas. 

But here the Night from the hill-top 
yonder. 
Steals all aloTie, nor yet too soon ; 
I have sighed for, and sought for, 
her ; sadder and fonder 
(All through the lonely and linger- 
ing noon) . 
Than a maiden that sits by the lat- 
tice to ponder 
On vows made in vain, long since, 
under the moon. 
Her dusky hair she hath shaken free. 
And her tender eyes are wild with 
love ; 
And her balmy bosom lies bare to me. 
She hath lighted the seven sweet 
Pleiads above. 
She is breathing over the dreaming 
sea, 
She is murmuring low in the cedar 

grove ; 
She hath put to sleep the moaning 
dove 
In the silent cypress-tree. 

And there is no voice nor whisper, — 
No voice nor whisper, 



In the hillside olives all at rest, 
Underneath blue-lighted Ilesper, 

Sinking, slowly, in the liquid west : 
For the night's heart knoweth best 
Love by silence most exprest. 
The nightingales keep mute 
Each one his fairy, flute. 
Where the mute stars look down, 
And the laurels close the green sea- 
side : 
Only one amoroiis lute 
Twangs in the distant town, 
Fi'om some lattice opened wide : 
The climbing rose and vine are here, 

are there. 
On the terrace, around, above me : 
The lone Ledasan * lights from yon 

enchanted air 
Look down upon my spirit, like a 
spirit's eyes that love me. 

How beautiful, at night, to muse on 
the mountain height. 
Moated in purple air, and all 
alone ! 
How beautiful, at night, to look into 
the light 
Of loving eyes, when loving lips 
lean down unto our own ! 
But there is no hand in mine, no 
hand in mine, 
Nor any tender cheek against me 
prest : 
O stars that o'er me shine, I pine, I 
pine, I pine, 
With hopeless fancies hidden in an 
ever-hungering breast ! 

O where, O where is she that should 
be here, 
The spirit my spirit dreameth ? 
With the passionate eyes, so deep, so 
dear. 
Where a secret sweetness beam- 
eth? 
O sleepeth she, with her soft gold 
hair 



" How oft, unwearied, have we spent the 

nights, 
Till the Ledsean stars, so famed for love, 
Wondered at us from above."— Co WliEY, 



IN ITAL Y. 



187 



Streaming over the fragrant pil- 
low, 
And a rich dream glowing in her ripe 
cheek, 
Far away, I know not where. 
By lonely shores, where the tum- 
bling billow 
Somids all nighl in an emerald 
creek ? 

Or doth she lean o'er the casement 
stone 
Wlien the day's dull noise is done 
with, 
And the sceptred spirit remounts 
alone 
Into her long-usurped throne, 
By the staii's the stais are won with ? 

Hearing the white owl call 
Where the river draws through the 
meadows below, 
By the beeches brown, and the 
broken wall, 
His silvery, seaward waters, slow 

To the ocean boimding all : 
With, here a star on his glowing 
breast. 
And, there a lamp down-stream- 
ing, 
And a musical motion towards the 
west 
Where the long white cliffs are 
gleaming ; 
While, far in the moonlight, lies at 
rest 
A great ship, asleep and dream- 
ing ? 

Or doth she linger yet 

Among her sisters and brothers. 
In the chamber where happy faces 
are met. 
Distinct from all the others ? 
As my star up there, be it never so 
bright, 
No other star resembles. 
Doth she steal to the window, and 

strain her sight 
(While the pearl in her warm hair 
trembles) 
Over the dark, the distant night, 



Feeling something changed in her 
liome yet ; 
That old songs have lost their old 
delight. 
And the true soul is not come yet ? 
Till the nearest star in sight 
Is drowned -in a tearful light. 

I would that I were nigh her. 
Wherever she rest or rove ! 

My spirit waves as a spiral fire 
In a viewless wind doth move. 

Go forth, alone, go forth, wild- 
winged Desire, 
Thou art the bird of Jove, 

That broodest lone by the Olympian 
throne ; 

And strong to bear the thunders 
which destroy. 

Or fetch the ravisht, flute-playing 
Phrygian boy ; 

Go forth, across the world, and find 
my love ! 

FATALITY. 

I HAVE seen her, with her golden 
hair, 
And her exquisite primrose face, 
And the violet in her eyes ; 
And my heart received its own de- 
spair — 
The thrall of a hopeless grace. 
And the knowledge of how youth 
dies. 

Live hair afloat Avith snakes of gold, 
And a throat as white as snow. 
And a stately figure and foot ; 
And that faint pink smile, so sweet, 
so cold, 
Like a wood anemone, closed be- 
low 
The shade of an ilex root. 

And her delicate milk-white hand in 
mine. 
And her pensive voice in my ear, 
And her eyes downcast as we 
speak. 
I am filled with a rapture, vague and 
fine ; 



IN ITAL Y. 



For there has fallen a sparkling 
tear 
Over her soft, pale cheek. 

And I know that all is hopeless now. 
And that which might have been, 
Had she only waited a year or 
two. 
Is turned to a wild regret, I know, 
Which will haunt us both, what- 
ever the scene. 
And whatever the path we go. 

Meanwhile, for one moment, hand 
in hand. 
We gaze on each other's eyes ; 
And the red moon rises above 
us ; 
We linger with love in the lovely 
land, — 
Italy with its yearning skies, 
And its wild white stars that 
love us. 

A VISION. 

The hour of Hesperus ! the hour 
when feeling 

Grows likest memory, and the full 
heart swells 
With pensive pleasure to the mellow 
pealing 
Of mournful music upon distant 
bells : 
The hour when it seems sweetest to 
be loved. 
And saddest to have loved in days 

no more. 
O love, O life, O lovely land of 
yore. 
Through which, erewhile, tliese 
weary footsteps roved, 

Was it a vision ? Or Irene, sitting, 
Lone in her chamber, on her snowy 
bed. 
With listless fingers, lingeringly un- 
knitting 
Her silken bodice ; and, with 
bended head, 
Hiding in warm hair, half-way to her 
knee, 



Her pearl-pale shoulder, leaning 

on one arm. 
Athwart the darkness, odorous and 
warm. 
To watch the low, full moon set, 

pensively ? 
A fragrant lamp burned dimly in the 
room. 
With scarce a gleam in either look- 
ing-glass. 
The melloV moonlight, through the 
deep-blue gloom. 
Did all along the dreamy chamber 
pass, [awc> 

As though it were a little toucht with 
(Being new-come into that quiet 

place 
In such a quiet way) at the strange 
grace 
Of that pale lady, and what else it 

saw ; — 
Rare flowers : narcissi ; irises, each 
crowned ; 
Red oleander blossoms ; hyacinths 
Flooding faint fi'agrance, richly 
curled all round, 
Corinthian, cool colmnnar flowers 
on plinths ; 
Wasen camelias, white and crimson 
ones ; 
And amber lilies, and the regal 

rose. 
Which for the breast of queens 
full-scornful grows ; 
All pinnacled in urns of carven 

bronze : 
Tables of inwrought stone, true 
Florentine, — 
Olympian circles thronged with 
Mercuries, 
Minervas, little Junos dug i' the 

green 
Of ruined Rome ; and Juno's own 

rich eyes 
Vivid on peacock plumes Sidonian : 
A ribboned lute, young Music's 

cradle : books, 
Vellumed and claspt : and with 
bewildered looks. 
Madonna's picture, — the old smile 
grown wan. 



rN ITALY. 



I§Q 



From blooined thickets, firefly- 
lamped, beneath 
The terrace, fluted cool the night- 
ingale. 
In at the open window came the 
breath 
Of many a balmy, dim blue, dream- 
ing vale. 
At intervals the howlet's note came 
clear, 
Fluttering dark silence through the 

cypress grove ; 
An infant breeze from the elf-land 
of Love, 
Lured by the dewy hour, crept, lisp- 
ing, near. 

And now is all the night her own, to 
make it 
Or grave or gay with throngs of 
waking dreams. 
Now grows her heart so ripe, a sigh 
might shake it 
To showers of fruit, all golden as 
beseems 
Hesperian growth. Why not, on 
nights like tliis, 
Should Daphne out from yon 

green laurel slip ? 
A Dryad from the ilex, wilh white 
hip 
Quivered and thonged to hunt with 
Artemis ? 



To-night, what wonder were it, 
while such shadows 
Are taking up such shai^es on 
moonlit moimtains. 
Such star-flies kindling o'er low 
emerald meadows. 
Such voices floating out of hillside 
fountains, 
If some full face should from the 
window greet her. 
Whose eyes should be new planet- 
ary lights. 
Whose voice a well of liquid love- 
delights, 
And to the distance sighingly entreat 
her? 



EROS. 

What wonder that I loved her thus, 

that night ? 
The Immortals know each other at 

first sight. 
And Love is of them. 

In the fading light 
Of that delicious eve, whose stars 

even yet 
Gild the long dreamless nights, aiul 

cannot set. 
She passed me, through the silence : 

all her hair. 
Her waving, warm, briglit hair 

neglectfully 
Poured I'ound her showy throat as 

without care 
Of its own beauty. 

And when she turned on me 
The sorrowing light of desolate eyes 

divine, 
I knew in a moment what our lives 

must be 
Henceforth. It lightened on me 

then and there. 
How she was irretrievably all mine, 
I hers, — through time, become eter- 
nity, [wise. 
It could not ever have been other- 
Gazing into those eyes. 

And if, before I gazed on them, my 
soul, [lowed, 

Oblivious of her destiny, had fol- 

In days forever silent, the control 

Of any beauty less divinely hal- 
lowed 

Than that upon her beautiful wliito 
brows, 

(The serene summits of all earthly 
sweetness !) 

Straightway the records of all other 
vows 

Of idol-worship faded silently 

Out of the folding leaves of memory, 

Forever and forever ; and my heart 
became 

Pure white at once, to keep in its 
completeness, 

And perfect purity, 

Her mystic name. 






190 



IN ITAL y. 



INDIAN LOVE-SONG. 

My body sleeps : my heart awakes. 

My lips to breathe thy name are 

moved 

In slumber's ear : then slimiber 

breaks ; 

And I am drawn to thee, beloved. 

Thou drawest me, thou drawest me. 

Through sleep, through night, i 

hear the rills. 
And hear the leopard in the hills. 
And down the dark I feel to thee. 

The vineyards and the villages 

Were silent in the vales, the rocks. 
I followed past the myrrhy trees. 

And by the footsteps of the tlocks. 
Wild honey, dropt from stone to 
stone, 

Where bees have been, my path 
suggests. 

The winds are in the eagles' nests. 
The moon is hid. I walk alone. 

Thou drawest me, thou drawest me 

Aci-oss the glimmering wilder- 
nesses. 
And drawest me, my love, to thee, 

With dove's eyes hidden in thy 
tresses. 
The world is many : my love is one. 

I find no likeness for my love. 

The cinnamons grow in the grove : 
The Golden Tree grows all alone. 

O who hath seen her wondrous 
hair ! 

Or seen my dove's eyes in the 
■ woods ? 
Or found her voice upon the air ? 

Her steps along the solitudes ? 
Or where is beauty like to hers ? 

She draweth me, she draweth me. 

I sought her by the incense-tree, 
And in the aloes, and in the firs. 

Where art thou, O my heart's de- 
light. 
With dove's eyes hidden in thy 
locks ? 
My hair is wet witli dews of night. 
My feet are torn upon the rocks. 



The cedarn scents, the spices, fail 
About me. Strange and stranger 

seems 
The path. There comes a sound 
of streams 
Above the darkness on the vale. 

No trees drop gums ; but poison 
flowers 
From rifts and clefts all round me 
fall ; 
The perfumes of thy midnight 
bowers. 
The fragrance of thy chambers, all 
Is drawing me, Is drawing me. 
Thy baths prepare ; anoint thine 

hair : 
Open the window : meet me there: 
I come to thee, to thee, to thee ! 

Thy lattices are dark, my own. 

Thy doors are still. My love, look 
out. 
Arise, my dove with tender tone. 

The camphor-clusters all about 
Ai-e whitening. Dawn breaks silent- 

ly. 

And all my spirit with the dawn 
Expands ; and, slowly, slowly 
drawn. 
Through mist and darkness moves 
toward thee. 



MORNING AND MEETING. 

One yellow star, the largest and the 
last 
Of all the lovely night, was fading 
slow 
(As fades a happy moment in the 
past) 
Out of the changing east, when, 
yet aglow 
With dreams her looks made mag- 
ical, from sleep 
I waked ; and oped the lattice. 

Like a rose 
All the red-opening morning 'gan 
disclose 
A ripened light upon the distant 
steep. 



IN ITAL Y. 



191 



A bell was chiming througli the 
crystal air 
From the high conveut-church 
upon the hill. 
The folk were loitering by to matin 
prayer. 
The church-bell called me out, 
and seemed to fill 
The air with little hopes. I reached 
the door [rise, 

Before the chanted hymn began to 
And float its liquid Latin melodies 
O'er pious groups about the marble 
floor. 

Breathless, I slid among the kneel- 
ing folk. 
A little bell went tinkling through 
the pause 
Of inward prayer. Then forth the 
low chant broke 
Among the glooming aisles, that 
through a gauze 
Of sunlight glimmered. 

Thickly throbbed my blood. 
I saw, dark-tresse'd in the rose-lit 

shade, 
Many a little dusk Italian maid. 
Kneeling with fervent face close 
where 1 stood. 

The morning, all a misty splendor, 
shook 
Deep in the mighty window's 
flame-lit webs. 
It touched the crowned Apostle with 
his hook, 
And brightened where the sea of 
jasper ebbs 
About those Saints' white feet that 
stand serene 
Each with his legend, each in his 

own hue 
Attired : some beryl-golden : sap- 
phire blue 
Some : and some ruby-red : some 
emerald-green. 

Wherefrom, in rainbow-wreaths, the 
rich light roiled 
About the snowy altar, sparkling 
clean. 



The organ groaned and pined, then, 
growing bold, 
Kevelled the cherubs' golden wings 
atween. 
And in the light, beneath the music, 
kneeled 
(As pale as some stone Virgin 

bending solemn 
Out of the red gleam of a granite 
cohmm) 
Irene with claspt hands and cold 
lips sealed. 

As one who, pausing on some 
mountain-height. 
Above the breeze that breaks o'er 
vineyard walls, 
Leans to the impulse of a wild de- 
light, 
Bows earthward, feels the hills 
bow too, and falls — 
I dropt beside her. Feeling seemed 
to expand 
And close : a mist of music filled 

the air : 
And, when it ceased in heaven, I 
was aware 
That, through a rapture, I had 
toucht her hand. 



THE CLOUD. 

With shape to shape, all day. 
And change to change, by foreland, 
firth, and bay. 
The cloud comes down from wan- 
dering with the wind. 
Through gloom and gleam across 
the -green waste seas ; 
And, leaving the white clitf and lone 
tower bare 
To empty air. 
Slips down the windless west 
and grows defined 
In splendor by degrees. 

And, blown by every wind 
Of wonder through all regions of the 
mind. 
From hope to fear, from doubt to 
sweet despite 



tgi 



THE WANDERkR 



Changing all shapes, and min- 
gling snow with fire, 
The thought of her descends, sleeps 
o'er the bounds 
Of passion, grows, and rounds 
Its golden outlines in a gradual 
light 
Of still desire. 



EOOT AND LEAF. 

The love that deep within me lies 
Unmoved abides in conscious 
power ; 

Yet in the heaven of thy sweet eyes 
It varies every hour. 

A look from thee will flush the 
cheek : 

A word of thine awaken tears : 
And, ah, in all I do and speak 

How frail my love appears ! 

In yonder tree, Beloved, whose 
boughs 
Are household both to earth and 
heaven. 
Whose leaves have murmured of our 
vows 
To many a balmy even, 

The branch that wears the liveliest 
green, 
Is shaken by the restless bird ; 
The leaves that nighest heaven are 
seen. 
By every breeze are stirred : 

But storms may rise, and thunders 
roll, 

Nor move the giant roots below ; 
So, from the bases of the soul. 

My love for thee doth grow. 

It seeks the heaven, and trembles 
there 

To every light and passing breath ; 
But from the heart no storm can tear 

Its rooted growth beneath. 



WARNINGS. 

Bewabe, beware of witchery I 

And fall not in the snare 
That lurks and lies in wanton eyes. 

Or hides in golden hair : 
For the Witch hath sworn to catch 
thee. 
And her spells are on the air. 
" Thou art fair, fair, fatal fan-, 
O Irene ! 
What is it, what is it, 

In the whispers of the leaves ? 
In the night-wind, when its bosom, 

With the shower in it, grieves ? 
In the breaking of the breaker. 
As it breaks upon the beach 
Through the silence of the night ? 

Cordelia ! Cordelia ! 
A warning in my ear — 
" Not here ! not here ! not here! 
But seek her yet, and seek her. 
See her ever out of reach. 
Out of reach, and out of sight ! " 

Cordelia ! 
Eyes on mine, when none can view 

me ! 
And a magic murmur through me ! 
And a presence out of Fairyland, 
Invisible, yet near ! 
Cordelia ! 
" In a time which hath not been : 
In a land thou hast not seen : 
Thou shalt find her, but not now : 
Thou shalt meet her, but not 
here : " • 
Cordelia ! Cordelia ! 
" In the falling of the snow : 
In the fading of the year : 

When the light of hope is low. 
And the last red leaf is sere." 
Cordelia ! 
And my senses lie asleep, fast asleep, 

O Irene ! 
In tho chambers of this Sorceress, 

the South, 
In a slumber dim and deep, 

She is seeking yet to keep. 
Brimful of poisoned perfumes, 

The shut blossom of ray youth. 
O fatal, fatal fair Irene I 



m ITALY. 



103 



But the whispering of the leaves, 
And the night-M'ind, when it grieves, 
And the breaking of tlie breaker, 
As it breaks upon the beaclr 
Through the silence of the 
night, 

Coi'delia ! 
Whisper ever in my ear 
"Not here ! not here ! not 
here ! 
But awake, O wanderer ! seek 
her, 
Ever seek her out of reach, 
Out of reach, and out of sight ! " 
Cordelia ! 

There is a star above me 

Unlike all the millions round it. 
There is a heart to love me, 
Although not yet I have found it. 
And awhile, 

O Cordelia, Cordelia ! 
A light and careless singer. 
In the subtle South I linger, 
While the blue is on the mountain, 
And the bloom is on the peach. 
And the fire-fly on the night, 

Cordelia ! 
But my course is ever nor- 

ward, 
And a whisper whispers "For- 
ward !" 
Arise, O wanderer, seek her. 
Seek her ever out of reach. 
Out of reach and out of sight ! 
Cordelia ! 
Out of sight, 
Cordelia ! Cordelia ! 

Out of reach, out of sight, 
Cordelia ! 



A FANCY. 

How sweet were life,— tAis life, if 
we 
(My love and I) might dwell to- 
gether 
Here beyond the summer sea, 
In the heart of summer weather ! 
13 



With pomegranates on the bough, 
And with lilies in the bower ; 

And a sight of distant snow, 
Kosy in the sunset hour. 

And a little house, — no more 
In state than suits two quiet 
lovers ; 
And a woodbine round the door. 
Where the swallow builds and 
hovers ; 

With a silver sickle-moon. 

O'er hot gardens, red with roses : 
And a window wide, in June, 

For serenades when evening 
closes : 

In a chamber cool and simple, 
Trellised light from roof to base- 
ment ; 
And a summer wind to dimple 
The white cm-tain at the case- 
ment : 

Where, if we at midnight wake, 
A green acacia-tree shall quiver 

In the moonlight, o'er some lake 
Where nightingales sing songs for- 
ever. 

With a pine-wood dark in sight ; 

And a bean-field climbing to us, 
To make odors faint at night 

Where we ro£to with none to view 
us. 

And a convent on the hill. 
Through its light green olives 
peeping 
In clear sunlight, and so still. 
All the nvms, you'd say, were 
sleeping. 

Seas at distance, seen beneath 
Gi'ated garden-wildernesses ; — 

Not so far but what their breath 
At eve may fan my darling's 
tresses. 

A piano, soft in sound, 

To make music when speech 
wanders. 
Poets reverently boimd, 

O'er whose pages rapture ponders. 



194 



THE WANDERER. 



Canvas, brushes, hues, to catch 
Fleeting forms in vale or moun- 
tain : 
And an evening star to watch 
When all 's still, save one sweet 
fountain. 

Ah ! I idle time away 

With impossible fond fancies ! 
For a lover lives all day 

In a land of lone romances. 

But the hot light o'er the city 
Drops, — and see ! on fire departs. 

And the night comes down in pity 
To the longing of our hearts. 

Bind thy golden hair from falling, 
O my love, my one, my own ! 

'Tis for thee the cuckoo's calling 
With a note of tenderer tone. 

Up the hillside, near and nearer. 
Through the vine, the corn, the 
flowers. 

Till the very air grows dearer. 
Neighboring our pleasant bowers. 

Now I pass the last Podere : 
There, the city lies behind me. 

See her fluttering like a fairy 
O'er the happy grass to find me ! 

ONCE. 

A FALLING star that shot across 
Tlie intricate and twinkling dark 

Vanisht, yet left no sense of loss 
Throughout the wide ethereal arc 

Of those serene and solemn skies 
That round the dusky prospect 
rose, 
And ever seemed to rise, and rise, 
Through regions of imreached re- 
pose. 

Far, on the windless mountain- 
range, 
One crimson sparklet died : the 
blue 
Flushed with a brilliance, faint and 
strange, 
The ghost of daylight, dying too. 



But half-revealed, each terrace ixrn 
Glimmered, where now, iu filmy 
flight, 
We watched return, and still return, 
The blind bats searching air for 
sight. 

With sullen fits of fleeting sound, 
Borne half asleep on slumbrous 
air, 
The drowsy beetle hummed around, 
And passed, and oft repassed us, 
there ; 

Where, hand in hand, our looks 
alight 
With thoughts om- pale lips left 
untold. 
We sat, in that delicious night. 
On that dim terrace, green and 
old. 

Deep down, far off, the city lay, 
When forth from all its spires was 
swept 
A music o'er our souls ; and they 
To music's midmost meanings 
leapt ; 

And, crushing some delirious cry 
Against each other's lips, Ave clung 
Together silent, while the sky 
Throbbing with sound around us 
hung ; 

For, borne from bells on music soft. 
That solemn hour went forth 
through heaven, 
To stir the starry airs aloft, 
And thrill the purple pulse of 
even. 

O happy hush of heart to heart ! 

O moment molten through with 
bliss ! 
O Love, delaying long to part 

That first, fast, individual kiss ! 

Whereon two lives on glowing lips 
Himg claspt, each feeling fold in 
fold. 
Like daisies closed with crimson 
tips. 
That sleep about a heart of gold. 



IN ITAL V. 



I9S 



Was it some drowsy rose that 
moved ? 
Some dreaming dove's patlietic 
moan ? 
Or was it my name fi-om lips be- 
loved ? 
And was it thy sweet breath, mine 
own, 

That made me feel the tides of sense 
O'er life's low levels rise with 
might, 
And pour my being down the im- 
mense 
Shore of some mystic Infinite ? 

"O, have I foimd thee, my soul's 
soul ! 
My chosen forth from time and 
space ! 
And did we then break earth's con- 
trol ? 
And have I seen thee face to face? 

" Close, closer to thy home, my 
breast, 
Closer thy darling arms enfold ! 
I need such warmth, for else the rest 
Of life will freeze me dead with 
cold. 

"Long was the search, the effort 
long, 
Ere I compelled thee from thy 
sphere, 
I know not with what mystic song 
I know not with what nightly 
tear : 

" But thou art here, beneath whose 
eyes 

My passion faltei's, even as some 
Pale wizard's taper sinks, and dies, 

When to his spell a spirit is come. 

"My brow is pale with much of 
pain : 
Though I am young, my youth is 
gone, 
And, shouldst thou leave me lone 
again, 
I think I could not live alone. 



" As some idea, half divined. 
With tumult works within the 
brain 

Of desolate genius, and the mind 
Is vassal to imperious pain, 

" For toil by day, for tears by night, 
Till, in the sphere of vision 
brought. 
Rises the beautiful and bright 
Predestined, but relentless 
Thought ; 

" So, gathering up the dreams of 
years. 
Thy love doth to its destined seat 
Else sovran, through the light of 
tears — 
Achieved, accomplish t, and com- 
plete ! 

" I fear not now lest any hour 
Should chill the lips my own have 
prcst ; 

For I possess thee by the power 
Whereby I am myself possest. 

" These eyes must lose their guiding 
light : 
These lips from thine, I know, 
must sever ; 
O looks and lips may disunite, 
But ever love is love forever I " 



SINCE. 

Words like to these were said, or 
dreamed . 

(How long since !) on a night di- j 
vine. 
By lips from which such rapture 
streamed 
I cannot deem those lips were 
mine. 

The day comes up above the roofs, 
All sallow from a night of rain ; 

The soimd of feet, and wheels, and 
hoofs 
In the blurred street begins again : 



196 



THE WANDERER. 



The same old toil— no end — no aim I 
The same vile babble in my ears ; 

The same unmeaning smiles : the 
same 
Most miserable dearth of tears. 

The same dull sound : the same dull 
lack 
Of lustre in the level gray : 
It seems like Yesterday come back 
With his old things, and not To- 
day. 

But now and then her name will fall 
From careless lips with little 
praise, 
On this dry shell, and shatter all 
The smooth indifference of my 
days. 

They chatter of her — deem her 
light— 
The apes and liars ! they who 
know 
As well to sound the unfathomed 
Night 
As her impenetrable woe ! 

And here, where Slander's scorn is 
spilt. 

And gabliling Folly clucks above 
Her addled eggs, it feels like guilt. 

To know that far away, my love 

Her heart on every heartless hour 
Is bruising, breaking, for my sake : 

While, coiled and numbed, and void 
of power. 
My life sleeps like a winter snake. 

I know that at the mid of night, 
(When she flings by the glittering 
stress 

!0f Pride, that mocks the vulgar sight. 
And fronts her chambei''s loneli- 
ness,) 

She breaks in tears, and, overthrown 
1 With sorrowing, weeps the night 
I away, 

' Till back to his unlovely throne 
Eetiurns the unrelenting day. 



All treachery could devise hath 
wrought 
Against us : — letters robbed and 
read : 
Snares hid in smiles : betrayal 
bought : 
And lies imputed to the dead. 

I will arise, and go to her, 

And save her in her own despite ; 
For in my breast begins to stir 

A pulse of its old power and might. 

They cannot so have slandered me 
But what, I know, if I should call 

And stretch my arms to her, that she 
Would rush into them, spite of all. 

In Life's great lazar-house, each 

breath 

We breathe may bring or spread 

the pest ; [death 

And, woman, each may catch his 

From those that lean upon his 

breast. 

I know how tender friends of me 
Have tallced with broken hint, and 
glance : 
— The choicest flowers of calumny, 
That seem, like weeds, to spring 
from chance ; — 

That small, small, imperceptibly 
Small talk, which cuts like pow- 
dered glass 
Ground in Tophana — none can tell 
Where lurks the power the poison 
has ! 

I may be worse than they would 
prove, 
(Who knows the worst of any 
man ? ) 
But, right or wrong, be sure my 
love* 
Is not what they conceive, or can. 

Nor do I question what thou art, 
Nor what thy life, in great or 
small. 
Thou art, I know, what all my heart 
Must beat or break for. That is 
all. 



IN ITAL Y. 



197 



A LOVE-LETTER. 

My love, — my chosen, — but not 
mine ! I send 
My whole heart to thee in these 
words I write ; 
So let the blotted lines, my soul's 
sole friepd, 
Lie upon thine, and there be blest 
at night. 

This flower, whose bruised purple 
blood will stain 
The page now wet with the hot 
tears that fall — 
(Indeed, indeed, I struggle to re- 
strain 
This weakness, but the tears come, 
spite of all ! ) 

I plucked it from the branch you 
used to praise, 
The branch that hides the wall. 
I tend your flowers. 
I keep the paths we paced in happier 
days. 
How long ago they seem, those 
pleasant hours. 

The white laburnum's out. Yoiir 

jixdas-tree 

Begins to shed those crimson buds 

of his. [ously 

The nightingales sing — ah, too joy- 

Who says those birds are sad ? I 

think there is 

That in the books we read, which 
deeper wrings 
My heart, so they lie dusty on the 
shelf. 
Ah me, I meant to speak of other 
things 
Less sad. In vain ! they bring me 
to myself. 

I know your patience. And I would 
not cast 
New shade on days so dark as 
yours are grown 
By weak and wild repining for the 
past, 
Since it is past forever, O mine 
own I 



For hard enough the daily cross you 
bear. 
Without that deeper pain reflec- 
tion brings ; 
And all too sore the fretful house- 
hold care. 
Free of the contrast of remembered 
things. 

But ah ! it little profits, that we 
thrust 
For all that's said, what both must 
fell, unnamed. 
Better to face it boldly, as we must. 
Than feel it in the silence, and be 
shamed. 

Irene, I have loved you, as men 
love 
Light, music, odor, beauty, love it- 
self !— 
Wliatever is apart from, and above 
Those daily needs which deal with 
dust and pelf. 

And I had been content, without one 
thought 
Our guardian angels could have 
blusht to knoAV, 
So to have lived and died, demand- 
ing nought 
Save, living dying, to have loved 
you so. 

My youth was orphaned, and my age 
will be 
Childless. I have no sister. None, 
to steal 
One stray thought from the many 
thoughts of thee, 
Wliich are the source of all I 
think and feel. 

My wildest wish was vassal to thy 
will : 
My haughtiest hope, a pensioner 
on thy smile. 
Which did with light my barren be 
ing fill, 
As moonlight glorifies some desert 
isle. 



198 



THE WANDERER. 



r I never tliouglit to know what I 
have known, — 
The rapture, dear, of being loved 
by you : 
I never thought, within my heart, to 
own 
One wish so blest that you should 
share it too : 

Nor ever did I deem, contemplat- 
ing 
The many sorrows iu this place of 
pain, 
So strange a sorrow to my life could 
clmg. 
As, being thus loved, to be beloved 
in vain. 

But now wc know the best, the 
worst. We have 
Interred, and prematurely, and un- 
known. 
Our youth, our hearts, our hopes, in 
one small grave, 
Whence we must wander, wid- 
owed, to our own. 

And if we comfort not each other, 
what 
Shall comfort us, in the dark days 
j to come ? 

Not the light laughter of the world, 
and not 
The faces and the firelight of fond 
home. 

And so I write to you ; and write, 
and write, 
For the mere sake of writing to 

(you, dear. 
What can I tell you, that you know 
not ? IX jght 
Is deepening" through the rosy 
atmosphere 

I About the lonely casement of this 
room, 
Wliich you have left familiar with 
the grace 
That grows where you have been. 
And on the gloom 
I almost fancy I can see your face. 



Not pale wifh pain, and tears re- 
strained for mo. 
As when I last beheld it ; but as 
first, 
A dream of rapture and of poesy, 
Upon my youth, like dawn oil 
dark, it burst. 

Perchance I shall not ever sec again 
That face. I know tliat I shall 
never see 
Its radiant beauty as I saw it then, 
Save by this lonely lamp of 
memory. 

With childhood's starry graces linger- 
ing yet 
I' the rosy orient of young woman- 
hood ; 
And eyes like woodland violets newly 
wet ; 
And lips that left their meanuig 
in my blood ! 

I will not say to you what I might 
say 
To one less worthily loved, less 
worthy love. 
I will not say . . . " Forget the past. 
Be gay. 
And let the all ill-judging woi-Id 
approve 

"Light in your eyes, and laughter 
on your lip." 
I will not say ..." Dissolve in 
thought forever 
Our sorrowful, but sacred, fellow- 
ship." 
For that would be, to bid you, 
dear, dissever 

Tour nature from its nobler heritage 
In consolations registered in hea- 
ven, J 
For griefs this world is barren to as- 
suage, 
And hopes to which, on earth, no 
home is given. 

But I would whisper, what forever- 
more 
My own heart whispers througli 
the wakeful night, . . . 



IN ITALY. 



[99 



*' This grief is but a shadow, flung 
before, 
From some refulgent substance 
out of sight." 

Wherefore it happens, in this riddling 
world, 
That, where sin came not, sorrow 
yet should be ; 
"VVliy heaven's most hurtful thimders 
should be hurled 
At what seems noblest in human- 
ity ; 

And we are punished for our purest 
deeds. 
And chastened for our holiest 
thoughts ; . . . alas ! 
There is no reason found in all the 
creeds, 
Why these things are, nor whence 
they come to pass. 

But in the heart of man, a secret 
voice 
There is, which speaks, and will 
not be restrained, 
Which cries to Grief .... "Weep 
on, while I rejoice, 
Knowing that, somewhere, all will 
be explained." 

I will not cant that commonplace of 
friends. 
Which never yet hath dried one 
mourner's tears, 
Nor say that grief's slow wisdom 
makes amends 
For broken hearts and desolated 
years. 

For who would barter all he hopes 
from life, 
To be a little wiser than his kind ? 
Who arm his nature for continued 
strife. 
Where all he seeks for hath been 
left behind ? 

But I would say, O pure and perfect 
pearl 
Which 1 have dived so deep in life 
to find, 



Locked in my heart thou liest. The 
wave may curl. 
The wind may wail above us. 
Wave and wind, 

What are their storm and strife to 
me and you ? 
No strife can mar the pure heart's 
inmost calm. 
This life of ours, what is it ? A very 
fe.v 
Soon-ended years, and then, — ll;c 
ceaseless i)salm. 

And the eternal sabbath of the 
soul ! - 
Hush ! . . . . while I write, from 
the dim Carmine 
The midnight angelus begins to roll. 
And float athwart the darkness up 
to me. 

My messenger (a man by danger 

tried) 

Waits in the courts below ; and 

ere our star [died. 

Upon the forehead of the dawn hath 

Beloved one, this letter will be far 

Athwart the mountain, and the mist) 
to you. 
I know each robber hamlet. I 
know all 
This moTuitain people. I have 
friends, both true 
And trusted, sworn towid whate'er 
befall. 

I have a bark upon the gulf. And I, 
If to my heart T yielded in this 
hour. 
Might say ..." Sweet fellow-suf- 
ferer, let us fly ! 
I know a little isle which doth em- 
bower 

" A home where exiled angels might 
forbear 
Awhile to mourn for paradise." . . 
But no ! 
Never, whate'er fate now may bring 
us, dear, 
Shalt thou reproach me for that 
only woe 

?§ 



200 



THE WANDERER. 



Which even love is powerless to con" 
sole ; 
Which dwells where duty dies : 
and haunts the tomb 
Of life's abandoned purpose in the 
soul ; 
And leaves to hope, in heaven it- 
self, no room. 

Man cannot make, but may ennoble, 
fate, 
By nobly bearing it. So let us 
trust, 
Not to ourselves, but God, and calm- 
ly wait 
Love's orient, out of darkness and 
of dust. 

Farewell, and yet again farewell, and 
yet 
Never farewell, — if farewell mean 
to fare 
Alone and disunited. Love hath set 
Our days, in music, to the self- 
same air ; 

And I shall feel, wherever we may 
be. 
Even though in absence and an 
alien clime. 
The shadow of the sunniness of 
thee, 
Hovering, in patience, through a 
cloudedJ^me. 

Farewell ! The dawn is rising, and 
the light 
Is making, in the east, a faint en- 
deavor 
To illuminate the mountain peaks. 
Good-niglit. 
Thine own, and only thine, my 
love, forever. 



CONDEMNED ONTIS. 

Above thy child I saw thee bend. 
Where in that silent room we sat 

apart. 
I watched the involuntary tear de- 

6cend ; 



The firelight was not all so dim, my 

friend. 
But I could read thy heart. 

Yet when, in that familiar room, 
I strove, so moveless in my place. 
To look with comfort iu thy face. 
That child's young smile was all that 

I could see 
Ever between us in the thoughtful 

gloom, — 
Ever between thyself and me, — 
With its bewildering grace. 

Life is not what it might have been, 

Nor are we what we would ! 

And we must meet with smiling 

mien. 
And part in careless mood. 
Knowing that each retains unseen. 
In cells of sense subdued, 
A little lurking secret of the blood — • 
A little serpent - secret rankling 

keen — 
That makes the heart its food. 

Yet is there much for grateful tears, 

if sad ones. 
And Hope's young orphans Memory 

mothers yet ; 
So let them go, the sunny days we 

had once. 
Our night hath stars that will not 

ever set. 
And in our hearts are harps, albeit 

not glad ones. 
Yet not all unmelodious, through 

whose strings 
The night-winds murmm- their fa- 
miliar things, 
Unto a kindred sadness : the sea 

brings 
The spirits of its solitude, with 

wings 
Folden about the music of its lyre, 
Thrilled with deep duals by sublime 

desire, 
Whicli never can attain, yet ever 

must aspire, 
And glorify regret, 



IN ITAL Y. 



What miglit have been, I know, is 

not : 
What must be, must be borne : 
But, ah ! what hath been will not 

be forgot. 
Never, oh ! never, in the years to 

follow ! 
Though all their summers light a 

■waste forlorn. 
Yet shall there be (hid from the care- 
less swallow 
And sheltered from the bleak wind 

in the thorn) 
In Memory's mournful but beloved 

hollow. 
One dear green spot ! 

Hope, the high will of Heaven 

To help us hath not given, 

But more than imto most of consola- 
tion : 

Since heart from heart may borrow 

Healing for deep heart-sorrow, 

And draw from yesterday, to soothe 
to-morrow, 

The sad, sweet divination 

Of that unuttered sympathy, which 
is 

Love's sorceress, and for Love's dear 
sake. 

About us both such spells doth 
make. 

As none can see, and none can 
break, 

And none restrain ; — a secret pain 

Olaspt to a secret bliss. 

A tone, a touch, 
A little look, may be so much ! 
Those moments brief, nor often, 
"Wlien, leaning laden breast to 

breast. 
Pale cheek to cheek, life, long re- 

prest, 
May gush with tears that leave half 

blest 
The want of bliss they soften. 
The little glance across the crowd, 
None else can read, wherein there 

lies 
A life of love at once avowed — 



The embrace of pining eyes. . . , 
So little more liad made earth heav- 
en, 
That hope to help us was not given ! 



THE STORM. 

Both hollow and hill were dumb as 
death, 
While the skies were silently 

changing form ; 
And tlie dread forecast of the 
thunder-storm 
Made the crouched land hold in its 
breath. , 

i 
But the monstrous vapor as yet was ; 
unriven ''■ 

That A\as breeding the thunder 

and lightning and rain ; 
And the Avind that was waiting to 
ruin the plain 
Was yet fast in some far hold of 
heaven. 

So, in absolute absence of stir or ; 
strife, ( 

The red land lay as still as a \ 
drifted leaf : ' 

The roar of the thunder had been 
a relief, 
To the calm of that death-broodincr 
life. 

At the wide-flung casement she stood ! 
full height, 
With her long rolling hair tumbled 

all down her back ; 
And, against the black sky's super- 
natural black, 
Her white neck gleamed scornfully 
white. 

I could catch not a gleam of her 
angered eyes 
(She was sullenly watching tho 

slow storm roll), 
But I felt they were drawing down 
into her soul 
The thunder that darkened the skieg, 



202 



THE WANDERER. 



And how coiild I feign, in that heart- 
less gloom. 
To be carelessly reading that 

stnpid page ? 
What harm, if I flung it in anguish 
and rage. 
Her book, to the end of the room ? 

" And so, do we part thus forever ? " 
... I said, 
" O, speak only one word, and I 

pardon the rest ! " 
She drew her u-hite scarf tighter 
over lier breast. 
But she never once turned round 
her head. 

" In this wicked old world is there 
nauglitto disdain ? 
Or " — I groaned — " are those 
dark eyes such deserts of 
blindness. 
That, O Woman ! j^our lieart must 
hoard all its imkindness, 
For the man on whose breast it liath 
lain ? 

" Leave it nameless, the grave of the 
grief that is past ; 
Be its sole sign the silence we 

keep for its sake. 
I have loved you — lie still in my 
heart till it break : 
As I loved, I must love to the last. 

'* Speak ! the horrible silence is 
stifling my soul." • 
She turned on me at once all the 

storm in her eyes ; 
And I heard the low thunder aloof 
in the skies. 
Beginning to mutter and roll. 

She turned — by the lightning re- 
vealed in its glare, 
And the tempest had clothed her 

with terror : it clung 
To the folds of her vaporous gar- 
ments, and hung 
In the heaps of her heavy wild hair. 



But one word broke the silence ; but 
one ; and it fell 
With the weight of a mountain 

upon me. Next moment 
The flei'ce levin flashed in my eyes. 
From my comment 
She was gone when I turned. Who 
can tell 

How I got to my home on the 
mountain ? I know 
That the thunder was rolling, the 

lightning still flashing, 
The great bells were tolling, my 
very brain crashing 
In my head, a few hours ago : 

Then all hushed. In the distance 
the blue rain receded ; 
And the fragments of storm were 

spread out on the hills ; 
Hard by, from my lattice, I heard 
the far rills 
Leaping down their rock-channels, 
wild-weeded. 

The round, red moon was yet low in 
the air. . . . 
O, I knew it, foresaw it, and felt 

it, before 
I heai'd her light hand on the 
latch of the door ! 
When it opened at last, — she was 
there. 

Childlike, and wistful, and sorrow- 
ful-eyed, 
With the rain on her hair, and the 

rain on her cheek ; 
She knelt down, with her fair 
forehead fallen and meek 
In the light of the moon at my side. 

And she called me by every caressing 
old name 
She of old had invented and chosen 

for me : 
She crouched at my feet, with her 
cheek on my knee, 
Like a wild thing grown suddenly 
tame. 



IN ITALY. 



203 



In the world there are ■women 
enough, maids or mothers ; 
Yet, in multiplied millions, I never 

should find 
The symbol of aught in her face, 
or her mind. 
She has nothing in common with 
ot.hers. 

And she loves me ! This morning the 
earth, pressed beneath 
Her light foot, keeps the print. 

'Twas no vision last night, 
For the lily she dropped, as she 
went, is yet white 
With the dew on its delicate sheath ! 



THE VAMPIEE. 

' I FOUND a corpse, with golden hair, 
Of a maiden seven mouths dead. 
But the face, with the death in it, 
still was fair, 
And the lips with their love were 

red. 
Rose leaves on a snow-drift shed, 
Blood-drops by Adonis bled, 
Doubtless were not so red. 

I combed her hair into curls of gold, 
And I kissed her lips till her lips 
were warm. 
And I bathed her body in moonlight 
cold. 
Till she grew to a living form : 
Till she stood up bold to a magic of 
old, 
And walked to a muttered 

charm — 
Life-like, without alarm. 

And she walks by me and she talks 
by me. 
Evermore, night and day ; 
For she loves me so, that, wherever 
I go, 
She follows me all the way — 
This corpse — you would almost 

say 
There pined a soul in the clay. 



Her eyes are so bright at the dead of 
night 
That they keep me awake with 
dread ; 
And my life-blood fails in my veins, 
and pales 
At the sight of her lips so red : 
For her face is as white as the pillow 
by night 
Where she kisses me on my bed : 
All lier gold hair outspread — 
Neither alive nor dead. 

I would that this woman's liead 
Were less golden about the hair : 

I would her lips were less red. 
And her face less deadly fair. 
For this is the worst to bear — 
How came that redness there ? 

'Tis my heart, be sure, she eats for 

her food ; 
And it makes one's whole flesh 

creep 
To think that she drinks and drains 

my blood 
Unawares, when I am asleep. 
How else could those red lips 

keep 
Their redness so damson-deep ? 

There's a thought like a serpent, 
slips 
Ever into my heart and head, — 
There are plenty of women, alive 
and human. 
One might woo, if one wished, and 
wed— 
Women with hearts, and brains , — ay 
and lips 
Not so very terribly red. 

But to house with a corpse — and she 

so fair. 
With that dim, unearthly, golden 
hair, 
And those sad, serene, blue eyes, 
With their looks from who knows 
where, 
Which Death has made so wise. 
With the grave's own secret 
there— 



304 



THE WANDERER. 



It is more than a man can 
bear ! 
It were better for me, ere I came 
nigh her, [her, 

This corpse — ere I looked upon 
Had they burned my body in flame 
and fire 
With a sorcerer's dishonor. 
For when the Devil hath made his 
lair, 
And lurks in the eyes of a fair 
young woman 
(To grieve a man's soul with her 
golden hair, 
And break his heart if his heart 
be hmuan), 
Would not a saint despair 
To be saved by fast or prayer 
From perdition made so fair ? 

CHAJSTGE. 

She is imkind, imkind ! 

On the windy hill, to-day, 

I sat in the sound of the wind. 

I knew what the wind would say. 

It said .... or seemed to my 

mind . . . 
Tlie flowers are falling away. 
The summer," ... it said, .... 

" will not stay, 
And Love will be left behind." 

The swallows were swinging them- 
selves 
In the leaden-gray air aloft ; 
Flitting by tens and twelves. 
And returning oft and oft ; 
Like the thousand thoughts in me, 
That went, and came, and went, 
Not letting me even be 
Alone with my discontent. 

The liard-vext weary vane 
liattled, and moaned and was still. 
In tlie convent over the plain. 
By tlie side of the windy hill. 
It was sad to hear it complain. 
So fretful, and weak, and shrill. 
Again, and again, and in vain, 
While the wind was changing his 
wiU. 



I thought of our walks last summer 
By the convent-walls so green ; 
On the first kiss stolen from her, 
With no one near to be seen. 
I thought (as we wandered on, 
Each of us waiting to speak) 
How the dayhght left us alone. 
And left his last light on her cheek. 

The plain was as cold and gray 
(With its villas like glimmering 

shells) 
As some north-ocean bay. 
All dumb in the church were the 

bells. 
In the mist, lialf a league away, 
Lay the little white house where she 

dwells, 

I thought of her face so bright, 
By the fii-elight bending low 
O'er her work so neat and Avhite ; 
Of her singing so soft and slow ; 
Of her tender-toned " Good-night;" 
But a very few nights ago. 

O'er the convent doors, I could see 
A pale and sorrowful-eyed 
Madoiina looking at me. 
As when Our Lord first died. 

There was not a lizard or spider 
To be seen on the broken walls. 
The ruts, with the rain, had grown 

wider 
And blacker since last night's falls. 
O'er the universal dulness 
There broke not a single beam. 
I thought how my love at its fulness 
Had changed like a change in a 

dream. 

The olives were shedding fast 
About me, to left and right. 
In the lap of the scornful blast 
Black berries and leaflets Avhite. 
I thought of the many romances 
One wintry word can blight ; 
Of the tender and timorous fancies 
By a cold look put to flight. 



JN ITALY. 



20S 



How many noble deeds 
Strangled perchance at their birth ! 
The smoke of the burning weeds 
Came up with the steam of the 

earth, 
From the red, wet ledges of soil, 
And the sere vines, row over row, — 
And the vineyard-men at their toil. 
Who sang in the vineyard below. 

Las-t Spring, while I thought of her 

here, 
I found a red rose on the hill. 
There it lies, withered and sere ! 
Let him trust to a woman who will. 

I thought how her words had grown 

colder, 
And her fair face colder still. 
From the hour whose silence had 

told her 
What has left me heart-broken and 

ill; 
And " Oh !" I thought, ..." if I 

behold her 
Walking there with him under the 

hill!" 

O'er the mist, from the mournful 

city 
The blear lamps gleamed aghast, — 
— "She has neither justice, nor 

pity," 
I thought, . . . " all's over at last," 
The cold eve came. One star 
Through a ragged gray gap forlorn 
Fell down from some region afar. 
And sickened as soon as born. 
1 thought, " How long and how lone 
The years will seem to be. 
When the last of her looks is gone. 
And my heart is silent in me ! " 

One streak of scornful gold. 
In the cloudy and billowy west, 
Burned with a light as cold 
Ab love in a much-wronged breast. 
I thought of her face so fair ; 
I Of her perfect bosom and arm ; 
Of her deep sweet eyes and hair ; 
Of her breath so pure and warm ; 



Of her foot so fine and fairy 
Through the meadows where she 

would pass ; 
Of the sweep of her skirts so airy 
And fragrant over the grass. 

I thought ..." Can I live without 

her 
Whatever she do, or say ?" 
I thought ..." Can I dare to doubt 

her, 
Now when I have given away 
My whole self, body and spirit, 
To keep, or to cast aside. 
To dower or disinherit, — 
To use as she may decide ? " 

The West was beginning to close 
O'er the last light burning there. 
I thought . . . "And when that 

goes. 
The dark will be everywhere ! " 

Oh ! well is it hidden from man 
Whatever the Future may bring. 
The bells in the church began 
On a sudden to sound and swing. 
The chimes on the gust were caught, 
And rolled up the windy height. 
I rose, and returned, and thought . . 

"1 SHALL, NOT SEE HER TO- 
NIGHT." 



A CHAIN TO WEAR. 

Away ! away ! The dream was 
vain. 
We meet too soon, or meet too 
late : 
Still wear, as best you may, the 
chain 
Your own hands forged about your 
fate. 

Who could not wait ! 

What ! . . . you had given your life 
away 
Before you found what most life 
misses ? 
Forsworn the bridal dream, you say, 
Of that ideal love, whose kisses 
Ai-e vain as this is 1 



5o6 



THE WANDEREk. 



Well, I have left upon your mouth 
The seal I know must burn there 
yet ; 
My claim is set upon your youth ; 
My sign upon your soul is set : 
Dare you forget ? 

And you '11 haunt, I know, where 
music plays, 
Yet find a pain in music's tone ; 
You '11 blush, of course, when others 
praise 
That beauty scarcely now your 
own. 

What's done, is done ! 

For me, you say, the world is 
wide, — 
Too wide to find the grave I seek ! 
Enough ! whatever now betide, 
No greater pang can blanch my 
cheek. 

Hush ! . . . do not speak. 

SILENCE. 

WoKDS of fire, and words of scorn, 
I have written. Let them go I 

Words of love — heart-broken, torn. 
With this strong and sudden woe. 

All my scorn, she could not doubt. 

Was but love turned inside out. 

Silence, silence, still unstirred ; 

Long, unbroken, unexplained : 
Not one word, one little word. 

Even to show her touched or 
pained : 
Silence, silence, all unbroken : 
Not a sound, a sign, a token. 

Well, let silence gather round 
All this shattered life of mine. 

Shall I break it by a sound ? 
Let it grow, and be divine — 

Divine as that Prometheus kept 

When for his sake the sea-nymphs 
wept. 

Let silence settle, still and deep ; 

As the mist, the thunder-cloud, 
O'er the lonely blasted steep. 

Which the red bolt hath not 
bowed, 



Settle, to drench out the star, 
And cancel the blue vales afar. 

In this silence I will sheathe 

The sharp edge and point of all ! 

Not a sigh my lips shall breathe ;. 
Not a groan, whate'er befall. 

And let this sworded silence be 

A fence 'twixt prying fools and me. 

Let silence be about her name, 
And o'er the things which once 
have been : 

Let silence cover up my shame. 
And annul that face, once seen 

In fatal hours, and all the light 

Of those eyes extinguish quite. 

In silence, I go forth alone 

O'er the solemn mj'^stery 
Of the deeds which, to be done, 

Yet undone in the future lie. 
I peer in Time's high nests, and there 
Espy the callow brood of Care, 

The fledgeless nurselings of Regret, 
With beaks forever stretched for 
food : 

But why should I forecount as yet 
The ravage of that vulture brood ? 

O'er all these things let silence stay. 

And lie, like snow, along my way. 

Let silence in this outraged heart 
Abide, and seal these lips forever; 

Let silence dwell with me apart 
Beside the ever-babbling river 

Of that loud life in towns, that runs 

Blind to the changes of the suns. 

Ah ! from what most mournful star, 
Wasting down on evening's edge, 

Or what ban-en isle afar 
Flung by on some bare ocean ledge, 

Came the wicked hag to us. 

That changed the fairy revel thus ? 

There were sounds from sweet gui- 
tars 
Once, and lights from lamps of 
amber ; 



Both went up among the stars 
From many a perfumed palace- 
chamber : 
Suddenly the place seemed dead ; 
Light and music both were fled. 

Darkness in each perfumed chamber; 

Darkness, silence, in the stars ; 
Darkness on the lamps of amber ; 

Silence in the sweet guitars : 
Darkness, silence, evermore 

Guard empty chamber, moveless 
door. 

NEWS. 

News, news, news, my gossiping 
friends ! 
I have wonderful news to tell. 
A lady, by me, her compliments 
sends ; 
And this is the news from Hell : 

The Devil is dead. He died resigned. 

Though somewhat opprest by 

cares ; 

But his wife, my friends, is a woman 

of mind, 

And looks after her lord's affairs. 

I have just come back from that 
wonderful place, 
And kist hands with the Queen 
down there ; 
But I cannot describe Her Majesty's 
face. 
It has filled me so with despair. 

The place is not what yoii might 
suppose : 
It is worse in some respects. 
But all that I heard there, I must 
not disclose. 
For the lady that told me objects. 

The laws of the land are not Salique, 

But the King never dies, of course ; 

The new Queen is yotmg, and pretty, 

and chic, 

There are women, I think, that are 

worse. 



But however that be, one thing 1 
k]iow, 
And this I am free to tell ; 
The Devil, my friends, is a woman, 
just now ; 
'Tis a woman that reigns in Hell. 



COUNT EINALDO KINALDI. 

'Tis a dark-purple, moonlighted mid- 
night : 
There is music about on the air. 
And, where, through the water, fall 
flashing 
The oars of each gay gondolier, 
The lamp-lighted ripples ai-e dashing, 

In the musical moonlighted air, 
To the music, in merriment ; wash- 
ing? 
And splashing, the black marble 
stair 
That leads to the last garden-terrace, 

Where many a gay cavalier 
And many a lady yet loiter. 
Round the Palace in festival there. 

'Tis a terrace all paven mosaic, — 

Black marble, and green malachite; 

Round an ancient Venetian Palace, 

Where the windows with lampions 

are bright. 

'Tis an evening of gala and festival, 

Music, and passion, and light. 
There is love in the nightingales' 
throats. 
That sing in the garden so well : 
There is love in the face of the moon : 
There is love in the warm languid 

glances 
Of the dancers adown the dim 
dances : 
There is love in the low languid notes 

That rise into rapture, and swell. 
From viol, and flute, and bassoon. 

The tree that bends down o'er the 
water 
So black, is a black cypress-tree. 
And the statue, there, under the 
terrace, 
Mnemosyne's statue must be. 



4o8 



THE WANDERER. 



There comes a black gondola slowly 
To the Palace in festival there : 

And the Count Rinaldo Rinaldi 
Has mouted the black marble stair. 

There was nothing but darkness, and 
midnight, 
And tempest, and storm, in the 
breast 
Of the Count Rinaldo Rinaldi, 
As his foot o'er the black marble 
prest : — 
The glimmering black marble stair 
Where the weed in the green ooze 
is clinging, 
That leads to the garden so fair, 
Where the nightingales softly are 

singing, — 
Where the minstrels new music 
are stringing, 
And the dancers for dancing prepare. 

There rustles a robe of white satin : 
There's a footstep falls light by the 
stair : 
There rustles a robe of white satin : 
There's a gleaming of soft golden 
hair : 
And the Lady Irene Ricasoli 

Stands near the cypress -tree 

there, — 
IJfear Mnemosyne's statue so fair, — 
The Lady Irene Ricasoli, 
With the light in her long golden 
hair. 

And the nightingales softly are sing 
ing I air; 

In the mellow and moonliglited 
And the minstrels their viols are 
stringing ; 
And the dancers for dancing pre- 
pare. 

" Siora," the Count said unto her, 
' ' The shafts of ill-fortune pursue 
me ; 
The old grief grows newer and newer, 
The old pangs are never at rest ; 
And the foes that have sworn to 

undo me 
Have left me no peace in my 
breast. 



They have slandered, and wronged, 
and maligned me : 
Though they broke not my sword 
in my hand, 
They have broken my heart in ir.y 
bosom [manned. 

And sorrow my youth has uu- 
But I love you, Irene, Irene, 
With such love as the wretched 
alone 
Can feel from the desert within them 
Which only the wretched have 
known ! 
And the heart of Rinaldo Rinaldi 
Dreads, Lady, no frown but your 
o\vn. 
To others be all that you are, love — 

A lady more lovely than most ; 
To me — be a fountain, a star, love, 

That lights to his haven the lost ; 
A shrine that with tender devotion. 
The mariner kneeling, doth deck 
"With the dank .weeds yet dripping 
fi'om ocean, 
And the last jewel saved from the 
wreck. 

" None heeds us, belove'd Irene ! 

None will mark if we linger or fly. 
Amid all the mad masks in yon revel, 

There is not an ear or an eye, — 
Not one,— that will gaze or will 
listen ; 

And, save the small star in the sky 
Which, to light us, so softly doth 
glisten, 

There is none will pursue us, Irene. 

O love me, O save me, I die ! 
I am thine, O, be mine, O beloved ! 

" Fly with mo, Irene, Irene ! 

The moon drops : the morning is 
near. 
My gondola waits by the garden 

And fleet is my own gondolier !" 
What the Lady Irene Ricasoh, 

By Mnemosyne's statue in stone, 
Where she leaned, 'neath the black 
cypress-troe. 

To the Count Rinaldo Rinaldi 

Replied then, it never was known. 
And known, now, it never will be. 



m ITALY. 



269 



But the moon hatli been melted in 
morning : 
And tlie lamps in the Miudows are 
dead : 
And the gay cavaliers from the ter- 
race, 
And tlie ladies they laughed with, 
are fled ; 
And the music is husht in the viols : 
And the minstrels, and dancers, 
are gone ; 
And the nightingales now in the 
garden, [one : 

From singing have ceased, one by 
But the Count Rinaldo Kinaldi 
Still stands, wliere he last stood, 
alone, 
'Neatli the black cypress-tree, near 

the water. 
By Mnemosyne's statue in stone. 

O'er his spirit was silence and mid- 
night, 
In his breast was the calm of de- 
spair. 
He took, with a smile, from a casket 

A single soft curl of gold hair, — 
A wavy warm curl of gold hair, 
And into the black-bosomed water 
He flung it athwart the black stair. 
The skies they were changing above 
liim ; 
The dawn, it came cold on the air; 
He drew from his bosom a kerchief — 
''Would." he sighed, "that her 

face was less fair ! 
That her face was less hopelessly 
fair." 
And folding the kerchief, he covered 
Tlie eyes of Mnemosyne there. 

THE LAST MESSAGE. 

Fling the lattice open. 

And the music plain you'll hear ; 
Lean out of the window. 

And you'll see the lamplight clear. 

There, you see the palace 
Wliere the bridal is to-night. 

You may shut the window. 
Come here, to the light. 
14 



Take this portrait with you, 
Look well before you go. 

She can scarce be altered 
Since a year ago. 

Women's hearts change lightly, 
(Truth both trite and olden !) 

But blue eyes remain blue ; 
Golden hair stays golden. 

Once I knew two sisters : 

One was dark and grave 
As the tomb ; one radiant 

And changeful as the wave. 

Xow away, friend, quickly ! 

Mix among the masks : 
Say you are the bride's friend, 

If the bridegroom asks. 

If the bride have dark hair. 

And an olive brow, 
Give her this gold bracelet ; — 

Come and let me know. 

If the bride have bright hair, 

And a brow of snow. 
In the great canal there 

Quick the portrait throw : 

And you'll merely give her 

Tills poor faded flower. 
Thanks ! now leave your stylet 

With me for an hour. 

You're my friend : whatever 

I ask you now to do. 
If the case were altered, 

I would do for you. 

And you'll promise me, my mother 
Shall never miss her son. 

If anything should happen 
Before the night is done. 



VENICE. 

The sylphs and ondines. 

And the sea-kings and queens, 
Long ago, long ago, on the waves 
built a city. 

As lovely as seems 

To some bard, in his dreams, 
The soul of his latest love-ditty. 



Long ago, long ago, — ah ! that was 
long ago 
Thick as gems on the chalices 

Kings keep for treasure. 
Were the temples and palaces 
In this city of pleasure ; 
And the night broke out shining 
With lan^ps and with festival, 
O'er the squares, o'er the 
streets ; 
And the soft sea went, pining 
With love, through the musical. 
Musical bridges, and marble 
retreats 
Of this city of wonder, where dwelt 

the ondines, 
liOng ago, and the sylphs, and the 
sea-kings and queens, 
— Ah ! that was long ago ! 
But the sylphs and ondines. 
And the sea-kings and queens 

Are fled mider the waves : 
And I glide, and I glide 
Up the glimmering tide 

Through a city of graves. 
Here will I bury my heart. 
Wrapt in the dream it dream- 
ed ; 
One grave more to the many ! 
One grave as silent as any ; 
Sculptured about with art, — 
For a palace this tomb once 
seemed. 
Light lips have laughed there, 
Bright eyes have beamed. 
Eevel and dance ; 
Lady and lover ! 
Pleasxu-e hath quaffed there : 
Beauty hath gleamed. 
Love wooed Eomance. 
Now all is over ! 
And I glide, and I glide 
Up the glimmering tide, 
'Mid forms silently passing, as silent 
as any, 
Here, 'mid the waves, 
In this city of graves, 
To bury my heart — one grave more 
to the many ! 



ON THE SEA. 

Come ! breathe thou soft, or blow 

thou bold, 
Thy coming be it kind or cold. 
Thou soul of the heedless ocean 

wind ; — 
Little I rede and little I reck. 
Though the mast be snapt on the 

mizzen-deck. 
So thou blow her last kiss from my 

neck. 
And her memory from my mind ! 

Comrades around the mast, 
The welkin is o'ercast : 
One watch is wellnigh past — 
Out of sight of shore at last ! 

Fade fast, thou falling shore. 
With that fair false face of yore, 
And the love, and the life, now o'er! 
What she sought, that let her have — 
The praise of traitor and knave. 
The simper of coward and slave. 
And the worm that clings and 

stings — 
The knowledge of nobler things. 

But here shall the mighty sea 
Make moan with my heart in me, 
And her name be torn 
By the winds in scorn, 
In whose march we are moving free. 
I am free, I am free, I am free ! 
Hark ! liow the wild waves roar ! 
Hark ! how the wild winds rave ! 
Courage, true hearts and brave. 
Whom Fate can afflict no more ! 

Comrades, the night is long. 

I will sing you an ancient song 

Of a tale that was told 

In the days of old, 

Of a Baron blithe and strong, — 

High heart and bosom bold. 

To strive for the right with wrong 1 

"Who left his castled home. 

When the Cross was raised in Rome, 

And swore on his sword 

To fight for the Lord, 

Andl^he banners of Christendom. 

To die or to overcome I 



IN ITAL Y. 



211 



" In liauberk of mail, and helmet of 

stee), 
And armor of proof from head to 

heel, 
( ), what is the woimd which he shall 

feel? 
And where the foe that shall make 

him reel ? 
True kniglit on whose crest the cross 

doth shine ! 
They buckled his harness, brought 

him his steed — 
A stallion black of the land's best 

breed — 
Belted his spurs, and bade him God- 
speed 
'Mid the Paynim in Palestine. 
But the w ife that he loved, when she 

poured bim up 
A last deep health in her golden cup. 
Put poison into the wine. 

"So he rode till the land he loved 
grew dim, 

And tbat poison began to work in 
him, 

A true knight cbanting his Chris- 
tian hymn, 

With the cross on his gallant crest. 

Eastward, aye, from the waning 
. west, 

Toward tbe land where the bones of 
the Saviour rest. 

Aud tbe Battle of God is to win : 

With liis yoiuig wife's pictm-e upon 
bis breast, 

And her poisoned wine within. 

" Alas ! poor knight, poor knight ! 
lie carries tbe foe he cannot fight 
In bis own true breast sbut up. 
He sball die or ever be fight for tbe 

Lord, 
And his heart be broken before his 

sword. 
lie hath pledged his life 



To a faithless wife, 

In the wine of a poisoned cup 1 " 

Comrade, thy hand in mine ! 
Pledge me in our last wine, 
While all is dark on the brine. 
My friend, I reck not now 
If the wild night-wind should blow 
Our bark beycmd the poles : — 
To drift through fire or snow, 
Out of reach of all we know — 
Cold heart, and luirrow brow, 
Smooth faces, sordid souls ! 
Lost, like sonie pale crew 
From Ophir, in golden galleys, 
On a witch's island ! who 
Wander the tamarisk alleys, 
Where the heaven is blue, 
And tbe ocean too, 
That murmurs among the valleys. 
" Perisbt with all on board ! " 
So runs the vagrant fume — 
Thy wife weds another lord, 
My children forget my name. 
While we count new stars by night. 
Each wanders out of sight 
Till tbe beard on his chin grows 

wliite 
And scant grow the curls on his 

head. 
One paces the placid hours 
In dim enchanted bowers. 
By a soft-eyed Panther led 
To a magical milk-white bed 
Of deep, pale poison-tlowers. 
With ruined gods one dwells, 
In caverns among the fells. 
Where, with desolate arms out- 
spread, 
A single tree stands dead, 
Smitten by savage spells. 
And striking a silent dread 
From its black and blighted head 
Through the horrible, hopeless, 

sultry dells 
Of Elephanta, the Eed. 



THE WANDERER. 



BOOK II -IN FRANCE. 



"PREN^SUS IN mq^mq:' 

'Tis toil must help us to forget. 
In strife, they say, grief finds re- 
pose. 
AVell, there's the game ! I throw 
the stakes : — 
A life of war, a world of foes, 
A heart that triumphs while it 
hreaks. 
Some day I too, perchance, may 

lose 
This shade w^hich memory o'er me 

throws. 
And laugh as others laugh, (who 
knows ? ) 
But ah, 'twill not be yet ! 

How many years since she and I 
Walked tha,t old terrace, hand-in- 
hand ! 
Just one star in the rosy sky. 

And silence on the summer laud. 
And she ? . . . 

I think I hear her sing 
That song, — the last of all our 
songs. 
How all comes hack ! — thing after 
thing. 
The old life o'er me throngs ! 
But I must to the palace go ; 

The ambassador's to-morrow : 
Here's little time for thought, I 
know, 
And little niore for sorrow. 
Already in the porte-cochere 
The carriage sounds . . . my hat 
and gloves ! 
I hear my friend's foot on the stair, — 

How joyotisly it moves ! 
He must have done some wicked 
thing 
To make him tread so light : 
Or is it only that the king 

Admired his wife last night? 
We talk of nations by the way, 



And praise the ]N"uncio's manners, 
And end with sometliiug fine to say 

About the " allied banners."' 
'Tis well to mix with all conditions 

Of men in every station : 
I sup to-mpri"Ow with musicians. 

Upon the invitation 
Of my clever friend, the journalist, 

Who writes the reading plays 
Which no one reads ; a socialist 

Most social in his ways. 
But I am sick of all the din 

That's made in praising Verdi, 
Who only know a violin 

Is not a hurdy-gurdy. 

Here oft, while on a nerveless hand 

An aching brow reclining. 
Through this tall window where I 
stand, 
I see the great town shining. 
Hard by, the restless Boulevart 
roars, 
Heard all the night through, even 
in dreaming : 
While from its hundred open doors 
The many-headed Life is stream- 
ing. . [fares 
Upon the world's wide thorough- 

j\[y lot is cast. So lie it ! 
Each on his back his burthen Ijears, 
And feels, though he may not 
see it. 
My life is not more hard than theirs 

Who toil on cither side : 
They cry for quiet in their prayers, 
And it is still denied. 

But sometimes, when I stand alone. 

Life pauses, — now and then : 
And in the distance dies the moan 

Of miserable men. 
As in a dream (how strange !) I seem 

To be lapsing, slowly, slowly. 
From noise and strife, to a stiller 
life, 

Where all is husht and holy. 



IN FRANCE. 



213 



Ah, love ! our way's in a stranger 
land. 
We may not rest together. 
For an Angel takes me by the hand, 
And leads me . . . whither ? 
whither ? 

A L'EXTRESOL. 

One circle of all its golden hours 
The Hitting hand of the Time- 
piece there. 
In its close white bower of china 
flowers, 
Hath rounded unaware : 

While the firelight, flung from the 
flickering wall 
On the large and limpid mirror be- 
hind. 
Hath reddened and darkened down 
o'er all, 
As the fire itself declined. 

Something of pleasure and something 
of pain 
There lived in that sinking light. 
What is it ? 
Faces I never shall look at again, 
In places you never will visit, 

licvealed themselves in each falter- 
ing ember. 
While, under a palely wavering 
flame. 
Half of the years life aches to re- 
member 
Reappeared, and died as they 
came. 

To its dark Forever an hour hath 
gone 
Since either you or I have spoken: 
p]ach of us might have been sitting 
alone 
In a silence so unbroken. 

I never shall know what made me 

loojc up 
(In this cushioned chair so soft 

and deep. 
By the table where, over the empty 

cup, I was leaning, half asleep) 



To catch a gleam on the picture up 
there 
Of the saint in the wilderness 
under the oak ; 
And a light on the brow of the bronze 
Voltaire, 
Like the ghost of a cynical joke. 

To mark, in each violet velvet fold 
Of the curtains that fall 'twixt 
room and room. 

The dip and dance of the manifold 
Shadows of rosy gloom. 



O'er 



the 



the Rembrandt there 

Caracci here^- 
Flutter warmly the ruddy and 

wavering hues ; 
And St. Anthony over his book has 

a leer 
At the little French beauty by 

Greuze. 

There, — the Leda, weighed over her 
white swan's back. 
By the weight of her passionate 
kiss, ere it falls ; 
O'er the ebony cabinet, glittering 
black 
Through its ivory cups and balls : 

Tour scissors and thimble, and work 
laid awajf. 
With its silks, in the scented rose- 
wood box ; 
The journals, that tell truth every 
day, 
And that novel of Paul de Kock's: 

The flowers in the vase, with their 
bells shut close 
In a dream of the far green fields 
where they grew ; 
The cards of the visiting people and 
shows 
In that bowl with the sea-green 
hue. 

Yoiu" shawl, with a queenly droop of 
its owii. 
Hanging over the arm of the crim- 
son chair : 



.^a^-i 



214 



7'IIE WANDERER. 



And, last, — yourself, as silent as 
stone, 
In a glow of the firelight there ! 

1 thought you were reading all this 
time. 
And was it some wonderful page 
of your book 
Telling of love, with its glory and 
crime, 
That has left you that sorrowful 
look ? 

For a tear from, those dark, .deep, 
humid orbs 
'ISTeath their lashes, so long, and 
soft, and sleek. 
All the light in yoiu- lustrous eyes 
absorbs, 
As it trembles over your cheek. 

Were you thinking how we, sitting 
side by side, 
"Might be dreaming miles and miles 
apart ? 
Or if lips could meet over a gulf so 
wide 
As separates heart from heart ? 

Ah, well ! when time is floAvn, how 
it fled 
It is better neither to ask nor tell. 
Leave the dead moments to bury 
their dead. 
Let us kiss and break the spell ! 

Come, arm in arm, to the window 
here ; 
Draw by the thick curtain, and see 
how, to-night. 
In the clear and fi"osty atmosphere. 
The lamps are bm-ning bright. 

All night, and forever, in yon great 
town. 
The heaving Boulevart flares and 
roars ; 
And the streaming Life flows up 
and down 
From its hundred open doors. 



It is scarcely so cold, but I and you, 
With never a friend to find us out, 

May stare at the shops for a moment 
or two, 
And wander awhile about. 

For when in the crowd we have 
taken our place, 
( — Just two more liv^s to the 
mighty street tluM-e !) 
Knowing no single form or face 
Of the men and women we meet 
there, — 

Knowing, and known of, none in the 
whole 
Of that crowd all round, but our 
two selves only. 
We shall grow nearer, soul to soul, 
Ujitil we feel less lonely. 

Here are your bonnet and gloves, 
dear. There, — 
How stately you look in that long 
rich shawl ! 
Put back your beautiful golden hair, 
That never a curl may fall. 

Stand in the firelight ... so, ... as 
you were, — 
O my heart, how fearfully like her 
she seemed ! 
Hide me up from my own despair. 
And the ghost of a dream I 
dreamed ! 



TERRA INCOGNITA. 

How sweet it is to sit beside her, 

When tlie hour brings nought 
that's better ! 
All day in my thoughts to hide her, 

And, with fancies free from fetter. 
Half remember, half forget her. 

Just to find her out by times 

In my mind, among sweet fancies 

Laid away : 

In the fall of mournful rhymes ; 

In a dream of distant climes ; 
In the sights a lonely man sees 



IN FRANCE. 



215 



At tlie dropping of the day ; 

Grave or gay. 
4.S a maiden sometimes locks 
With old letters, whose contents 
Tears have faded, 
[n an old worm-eaten box, 
Some sweet packet of faint 
scents, 

Silken-braided ; 
And forgets it : 
Careless, so I hide 

In my life her love, — 
Fancies on each side. 
Memories heaped above : — 
There it lies, unspied : 

Nothing frets it. 
On a sudden, when 

Deed, or word, or glaiir^ 
Brings me back again 
To the old romance, 
With what rapture then, — 
When, in its completeness. 
Once my heart hath found 
By each sense detected, 
•Steals on me the sweetness 
Of the air around it, 
Wliere it lies neglected ! 
.Shall I break the charm of this 

In a single minute ? 
For some chance with fuller bliss 

Proffered in it ? 
Si?crets unsealed by a kiss, 

Could I win it ! 
'Tis so sweet to linger near her, 

Idly so ! 
Xever reckoning, while I hear her 

Whispering low. 
If each whisper will make clearer 

Bliss or woe ; 
Never roused to hope or fear her 

Yes or No ! 
What if. seeking something more 

Than before, 
All that's given I displace — 

Calm and grace — 
Nothing ever can restore. 
As of yore. 
That old quiet face ! 
Quiet skies in quiet lakes, 
No wind wakes, 
All their beauty double : 



But a single pebble breaks 
Lake and sky to trouble ; 
Then dissolves the foam it makes 

In a bubble. 
With the pebble in my hand, 
Here, upon the brink, I stand ; 
Meanwhile, standing on the brink, 

Let me tliink ! 
Not for her sake, but for mine, 
Let those eyes unquestioned shine, 

Half divine : 
Let no hand disturb the rare 
Smoothness of that lustrous hair 

Anywhere : 
Let that white breast never break 
Its calm motion — sleep or wake — 

For my sake. 
Not for her sake, but for mine, 
All I might have, I resign. 

Siioukl I glow 
To the hue — the fragrance fine — 
The mere first sight of tlie wine, 
If I drained the goblet low ? 

Who can know ? 
With her beauty like the snow. 
Let her go ! Shall I repine 
That no idle breath of mine 
Melts it ? No ! 'Tis better so. 
All the same, as she came, 
With her beauty like the snow. 
Cold, unspotted, let her go ! 



A REMEMBRANCE. 

'TwAS eve and May when last, 
through tears, 
Thine eyes sought mine, thy hand 
my hand. 
The night came down her silent 
spheres. 

And up the silent land. 

In silence, too, my thoughts were 
furled, 
Like ring-doves in the dreaming 
grove. 
Who would not lightly lose the world 
To keep such love ? 



2l6 



THE WANDERER. 



But many Mays, Tvith all their flow- 
ers, 
Ai'e faded since that blissful time — 
The last of all my happy hours 
I' tl)c golden clime ! 

By hands not thine these wreaths 
were curled 
That hide the care my hrows 
above : 
And I have almost gained the world , 
But lost that love. 

As though for some serene dead 
brow, 
These wreaths for me I let them 
twine, 
I hear the voice of praise, and know 
It is not thine. 

How many long and lonely days 

I strove with life thy love to gain ! 
I know my work was worth thy 
praise ; 

But all was vain. 

Yain Passion's fire, vain Music's art ! 
For who from thorns grape- 
bunches gathers ? 
What depth is in the shallow heart ? 
What weight in featliers ? 

As drops the blossom, ere the growth 

Of fruit, on some autumnal tree-, 
I drop from my changed life, its 
youth 

And joy in thee : 

And look beyond, and o'er thee, — 
right 
To some sublimer end than lies 
Within the compass of the sight 
Of thy cold eyes. 

With thine my soul hath ceased its 
strife. 
Thy part is filled ; thy work is 
done ; 
Thy falsehood buried \\\ my life, 
And known to none. 



Yet still will golden momories frame 

Thy broken image in my heart. 
And love for what tliou wast shut 
blame 

Fi'om what thou art. 

In Life's long galleries, haunting- 
eyed. 
Thy pictured face no change shall 
show ; 
Like some dead Queen's who lived 
and died 

An age ago ! 



MADAME LA MARQUISE. 

The folds of her wine-dark violet 
dress 

Glow over the sofa, fall on fall. 
As she sits in the air of her loveliness 

With a smile for each and for all. 

Half of her exquisite face in the 
shade 
Which o'er it the screen in her 
soft hand flings : 
Through the gloom glows her hair 
in its odorous braid : 
In the firelight are sparkling her 
rings. 

As she leans. — the slow smile half 
shut up in her eyes 
Beams the sleepy, long, silk-soft 
lashes beneath ; 
Through her crimson lips, stirred by 
her faint replies. 
Breaks one gleam of her pearl- 
white teeth. 

As she leans, — where your eye, by 
her beauty subdued. 
Droops — fi-om under M'arm fi'inges 
of broidery white 
The slightest of feet — silken-slip- 
pered, protrude, 
For one moment, then slip out of 
sight. 

As I bend o'er her bosom, to tell her 
the news, 
The faint scent of her hair, the 
approach of her cheek, 



IN FRANCE. 



217 



The vague warmtli of her breath, all 
my senses suffuse 
With HEP.SELF : and I tr<3mhle to 

sjicak. 

So she sits in the curtained, luxu- 
rious light 
Of tliat room, with its porcelain, 
and pictures, and flowers. 
When the dark day's half done, and 
the snow flutters white, 
Past the windo\\s in feathery 
showers. 

All without is so cold, — 'neath the 
low leaden sky ! 
Down the bald, empty street, like 
a ghost, the gendarme 
Stalks surlv : a distant carriage hums 
by:- 
All Mithin is so bright and so 
warm ! 

Here we talk of the schemes and the 
scandals of court, 
How the courtesaB pushes : the 
charlatan thrives : 
We put horns on the heads of our 
friends, just for sport : 
Put intrigues in the heads of their 
M'ives. 

Her Mann hand, at parting, so 
strangely thrilled mine. 
That at dinner I scarcely remark 
what they say, — 
Drop the ice in my soup, spill the 
salt in my wine. 
Then go yawn at my favorite play. 

But she drives after noon : — then's 
the time to behold her. 
With her fair face half hid, like a 
ripe peei^ing rose, 
'Xeath that veil, — o'er the velvets 
and furs which enfold her, 
Leaning back with a queenly re- 
pose, — 

As she glides up the sunlight ! . . . 
You'd say she was made 
To loll back in a carriage, all day, 
with a smile, 



And at dusk, on a sofa, to lean in 
the shade 
Of soft lamps, and be wooed for a 
while. 

Could we find out her heart through 
that velvet and lace ! 
Can it beat without ruflJing her 
sumptuous dress ? 
She will show us her shoulder, her 
bosom, her face ; 
But what the heart's like, we must 
guess. 



be 



(- 



With live women and men to 
found in the world — 
Live with sorrow and sin, — 
live with pain and with pas- 
sion, — ) 

Who could live with a doll, though 
its locks should be curled^ 
And its petticoats trimmed in the 
fashion ? 

'Tis so fair ! . . . would my bite, if I 
bit it, draw blood ? 
Will it cry if I hurt it ? or scold if 
I kiss ? 
Is it made, with its beauty, of wax or 
of wood ? 
.... Is it worth while to guess at 
all this ? 



THE NOVEL. 

" Here, I have a book at last — 
Sure," I thought, "to make you 
weep ! " 

But a careless glance you cast 
O'er its pages, half asleep. 

'Tis a novel, — a romance, 

(Wliat you will) of youth, of lioine. 
And of brilliant days in France, 

And long moonlit nights in lioine. 

'Tis a tale of tears and sins. 
Of love's glory and its gloom ; 

In a ball-room it begins. 
And it ends beside a tomb ; 



2l8 



THE WANDERER 



There's a little heroine too, 

Whom each chapter leaves more 
pale ; 
And her eyes are dark and blue 

Like the violet of the vale ; 

And her hand is frail and fair : 
Could you but have seen It lie 

O'er the convent death-bed, where 
Wept the nims to watch her die, 

You, I think, had wept as well ; 

For the patience in her face 
(Where the dying sunbeam fell) 

Had such strange heart-breaking 
grace. 

There's a lover, eager, bold. 
Knocking at the convent gate ; 

But that little hand grows cold. 
And the lover knocks too late. 

There's a high-born lady stands 
At a golden mirror, pale ; 

Something makes her jewelled hands 
Tremble, as she hears the tale 

Which her maid (while weaving 
roses 
For the ball, through her dark 
hair) 
Mixed with other news, discloses. 
O. to-night she will look fair ! 

There's an old man, feeble-handed. 
Counting gold . . . "My son shall 
wed 

With the Princess, as I planned il. 
Now that little girl is dead." 

There's a young man, sullen, husht, 
By remorse and grief unmanned. 

With a withered primrose crusht 
In his hot and feverish hand. 

There's a broken-hearted woman. 
Haggard, desolate, and wild. 

Says . . . "The world hath grown 
inhuman ! 
Bury me beside my child." 

And the little god of this world 
Hears them, laughing in his 
sleeve. 



He is master still in his world, 
There's another, we believe. 

Of this history every part 
You have seen, yet did not heed 
it; 
For 'tis written in my heart. 
And you have not learned to read 
it. 



AUX ITALIENS. 

At Paris it was, at the Opera 
there ; — 
And she looked like a queen in a 
book, that night. 
With the wreath of pearl in her ra- 
ven hair. 
And the brooch on her breast, so 
bright. 

Of all the operas that Verdi wrote. 
The best, to my taste, is the Tro- 
vatore : 
And Mario can soothe with a tenor 
note 
The souls in Purgatory. 

The moon on the tower slept soft as 
snow : 
And who was not thrilled in the 
strangest way, 
As we heard him sing, while the gas 
burned low, 
" Non ti scordar di me " ? 

The Emperor there, in his box of 
state, 
Looked grave, as if he had just 
then seen 
The red tlag wave from the city-gate, 
AVhere his eagles in bronze had 
been. 

The Empress, too, had a tear in her 
eye. 
You'd have said that her fancy 
had gone back again, 
For one moment, under the old blue 
sky, 
To the old glad life in Spain, 



IN FRANCE. 



219 



Well ! there in our front-row box we 
sat, 
Together, my bride-lietiotiicd and 

I; 

My gaze was fixed on my opera-hat, 
"And hers on the stage hard by. 

And both were silent, and both were 
sad. 
Like a queen, she leaned on her 
full Avhite arm, 
Witii that regal, indolent air she 
had ; 
So confident of her charm ! 

I have not a doubt she was thinking 
then 
Of her former lord, good soul that 
he was ! 
Who died the richest and roimdest 
of men. 
The Marquis of Carabas. 

I hope that, to get to the kingdom of 
heaven. 
Through a needle's eye he had not 
to pass. 
I Avish him well, for the jointure 
given 
To my lady of Carabas. 

Meanwhile, I was thinking of my 
first love, 
As I had not been thinking of 
aught for years. 
Till over my eyes there began to 
move 
Something that felt like tears. 

I thought of the dress that she wore 
"last time, 
Wlien we stood, 'neaththe cypress- 
trees, together. 
In that lost land, in that soft clime. 
In the crimson evening weather : 

Of that muslin dress (for the eve was 
hot), 
And her warm white neck in its 
golden chain, 
And her full, soft hair, just tied in a 
knot. 
And falling loose again : 



And the jasmin-flower in her fair 
yoimg breast : 
(O the faint, sweet smell of that 
jasmin-flower !) 
And the one bird singing alone to 
his nest : 
And the one star over the tower. 

I thought of our little quarrels and 
strife ; 
And the letter that brought me 
back my ring. 
And it all seemed then, in the waste 
of life, 
Such a very little thing ! 

For I thought of her grave below the 
hill, 
Wliich the sentinel cypress-tree 
stands over. 
And I thought ..." were she only 
living still, 
How I could forgive her, and love 
her!" 

And I swear, as I thought of her 
thus, in that hour. 
And of how, after all, old things 
were best, 
That I smelt the smell of that jas- 
min-flower, 
Which she used to wear in her 
breast. 

It smelt so faint, and it smelt so 
sweet, 
It made me creep, and it made me 
cold! 
Like the scent that steals from the 
crumbling sheet 
Where a mummy is half unrolled. 

And I turned and looked. She was 

sitting there 
In a dim box, over the stage ; and 

drest 
In that muslin dress, with that full 

soft hair. 
And that jasmin in her breast ! 

I was here : and she was there : 
And the glittering horshoe cm-ved 
between : — 



THE WANDERER. 



From my bride-betrothed, witli lier 
raven Lair, 
And her sumptuous, scornful 
mien. 

To my early love, with her eyes 
downcast. 
And over her primrose face the 
shade, 
(In short, from the Future back to 
the Fast) 
There was but a step to be made. 

To my early love from my future 
bi'ide 
One moment I looked. Then I 
stole to the door, 
I traversed the passage ; and down 
at her side, 
I was sitting, a moment more. 

jNIy thinking of her, or the music's 
straui, 
Or something which never will be 
exprest, 
Had brought her back from the grave 
again, 
Withthe jasmin in her breast. 

She is not dead, and she is not wed! 
But she loves me now, and she 
loved me then ! 
And the very first word that her 
sweet lips said. 
My heart grew youthful again. 

The Marchioness tliere, of Carabas, 
She is wealthy, and young, and 
handsome still. 
And but for her . . . well, we'll let 
that pass. 
She may marry whomever she 
will. 
V>\\\ I will marry my own first love, 
With her primrose face : for old 
things are best. 
And the tiower in her bosom, I prize 
it above 
The brooch in my lady's breast. 

The world is filled with folly and 
sin, 
And Love must ciing where it can, 
I say : 



For Beauty is easy enough to win ; 
But one isn' t loved every day. 

And Ithhik, in the lives of most wo- 
men and men. 
There's a moment when all \.vould 
. go smooth and even, 
If only the dead could find out when 
To come back, and be forgiven. 

But O the smell of that jasmin- 
flower ! *' 
And O that music ! and O the way 
That voice rang out from the donjon 
tower 
A^oji ii scordar di me, 
Non ti scordar di me ! 



PROGRESS. 

When Liberty lives loud on every 
lip, 
But Freedom moans. 
Trampled by Nations whose faint 
foot-falls slip 
Round bloody thronc^s ; 
When, here and there, in dungeon 
and in thrall, 
Or exile pale. 
Like torches dying at a funeral. 

Brave natures fail : 
When Truth, the armed archangel, 
stretches wide 
God tromp in vain. 
And the world, drowsing, turns up- 
on its side 
To drowse again ; 
O Man, whose course hath called it- 
self sublime 
Since it began, 
"Wliat art thou in such dying age of 
time, 
As man to man ? 

When Love's last wrong hath been 
forgotten coldly. 
As First Love's face : 
Viul. like a rat that comes to wanton 
V.oldly 
in some lone place, 



IN FRANCE. 



221 



Once festal, — in tlie realm of light 
and laughter 
Grim Doubt appears ; 
Whilst weird suggestions from 
Death's vague Hereafter, 
O'er ruined years. 
Creep, dark and darl^er, with new 
dread to mutter 
Through Life's long shade, 
Yet make no more in the cliill breast 
the flutter 
Winch once they made : 
Whether it be, — that all doth at the 
grave 
Hound to its term, 
That nothing lives in that last dark- 
ness, save 
The little worm, 
*0r whether the tired spirit prolong 
its course 
Through realms unseen, — 
Secure, that unknown world cannot 
be worse 
Than this hath been ; 
Then when through Thought's gold 
chain, so frail and slender, 
No link will meet ; 
When all the broken harps of 
Language render 
No sound that's sweet : 
When, lilce torn books, sad days 
weigli down each other 
I' the dusty shelf ; 
O Man, what art thou, O my friend, 
my brother. 
Even to thyself j* 



THE PORTRAIT. 

Midnight past ! Not a sound of 
aught 
Througli the silent house, but the 
wind at his prayers. 
1 sat by the dying tire, and thought 
Of the dear dead woman up stairs. 

A night of tears ! for the gusty rain 
Had ceased, but the eaves were 
dripping yet ; 



And the moon looked forth, as 
though in pain. 
With her face all white and wet : 

Nobody with me, my watch to keep 
But the friend of my bosom, the- 
man I Jove : 

And grief had sent him fast to sleep 
In "the chamber up above. 

Nobody else, in the country place 

All round, that knew of my loss 

beside. 

But the good young Priest with the 

Raphael-face, [died. 

Who confessed her when slie 

That good young Priest is of gentle 
nerve. 
And my grief had moved him be- 
yond control ; 
For his lip grew white, as I could 
observe, 
When he speeded her parting soul. 

I sat by the dreary hearth alone : 
I thought of the pleasant days of 
yore : 

I said " the staff of my life is gone : 
The woman I loved is no more. 

•' On her cold, dead bosom my por- 
trait lies, 
Which next to her heart she used 
to wear — 
Haunting it o'er with her tender 
eyes 
When my own face was not there. 

" It is set all round with rubies red, 
And pearls which a Peri niighl 
have kept. 
For each ruby there, my heart hath 
bled : 
For each pearl, my eyes have 
wept." 

And I said — " the thing is precious 
to me : 
They will bury her soon in the 
cluu'chyard clay ; 
It lies on her heart, and lost must 
be, 
If I do not take it away." 



222 



THE WANDERER. 



I lighted my lami3 at tlie dying 
flame, 
And crept up tlie stairs that 
creaked for fright, 
Till into the chamber of death I 
came. 
Where she lay all in white. 

The moon shone over her winding- 
sheet. 
There, stark she lay on her carvcn 
bed : 
Seven burning tapers about her feet, 
And seven about her head. 

As I stretched my hand, I held my 
breath ; 
I turned as I drew the curtains 
apart : 
I dared not look on the face of 
death : 
I knew where to find her heart, 

I thought, at first, as my touch fell 
there. 
It had warmed that heart to life, 
with love ; 
For the thing I touched was warm, 
I swear, 
And I could feel it move. 

Twas the hand of a man, that was 
moving slow 
O'er the heart of the dead, — ^from 
the other side ; 
And at once the sweat broke over 
my brow, 
" Who is robbing the corpse ? " I 
cried. 

Opposite me by the tapers' light, 
The friend of my bosom, the man 
I loved. 
Stood over the corpse and all as 
white. 
And neither of us moved. 

" What do you here, my friend ? " 
. . . The man 
Looked first at me, and then at 
the dead. 
" There is a portrait here," he 
began ; 
" There is. It is mine," I said. 1 



Said the friend of my hosom, " yours 
no doubt. 
The portrait was, till a month ago, 
When this suffering angel took that 
out, 
And placed mine there, I know. ' 

" This woman, she loved me well, 
said I. 
" A month ago," said my friend 
to me ; 
"And in your throat," I groaned, 
"you lie ! "• 
He answered . . . "let us see." 

" Enough ! " I returned, "let the 
dead decide : 
And whose soever the portrait 
prove. 
His shall it be, when the cause is 
tried, 
Whci-e Death is arraigned by 
Love." 

We fomid the portrait there, in its 
place : 
We opened it, by the tapers' shine: 
The genis were all unchanged : the 
face 
Was — neither his nor mine. 

" One nail drives out another, at 
least ! 
The face of the portrait there," 1 
cried, 
" Is our friend's, the Eaphael-faced 
young Priest, 
Who confessed her when she 
died." 

The setting is all of rubies red. 
And pearls' which a Peri might 
have kept. 
For each ruby there my heart hath 
bled : 
For each pearl my eyes have wept. 



AST ARTE. 

When the latest strife is lost, and all 
is done Avith, 
Ere we slumber in the spirit and 
the brain, 



We drowse back, in dreams, to days 
that life begun -with, 
And their tender light returns to 
us again. 

I have cast away the tangle and the 
torment 
Of the cords that boimd my life up 
in a mesh : 
And the pulse begins to throb that 
long lay dormant 
'Neath their pressure ; and the 
old wounds bleed afresh. 

I am touched again with shades of 
early sadness. 
Like the summer-cloud's light 
shadow in my hair : 
1 am thrilled again witli breaths of 
boyish gladness, 
Like the scent of some last prim- 
rose on the air. 

And again she comes, with all her 
silent graces 
The lost woman of my youth, yet 
impossest : 
And her cold face so unlike the 
other faces 
Of the women whose dead lips I 
since have prest. 

The motion and the fragrance of her 
garments 
Seem about me, all the day long, 
in the room : 
And her face, with its bewildering 
old endearments 
Comes at night between the 
curtains, in the gloom. 

When vain dreams are stirred with 
sighing, near the morning, 
To my own her phantom lips I 
feel approach : 
And her smile, at eve, breaks o'er 
me without warning 
From his speechless, pale, per- 
petual reproach. 

When Life's dawning glimmer yet 
had all the tint there 
Of the orient, in the freshness of 
the grass. 



(Ah, what feet since then have 
trodden out the print there !) 
Did her soft, her silent footsteps 
fall, and pass. 

They fell lightly, as the dew falls, 
'mid ungathered 
Meadow - flowers ; and lightly 
lingered with the dew. 
But the dew is gone, the grass is 
dried and withered. 
And the traces of those steps 
have faded too. 

Other footstejis fall about me, — faint, 
uncertain. 
In the shadow of the world, as it 
recedes : 
Other forms peer through the half- 
uplifted curtain 
Of that mystery which hangs be- 
hind the creeds. 



What is gone, is gone forever. And 
new fashions 
May replace old forms which noth- 
ing can restore : 
But I turn from sighing back de- 
Ijarted passions 
With that pining at the bosom as 
of yore. 

I remember to have miu-mured.morn 
and even, 
" Though the Earth dispart these 
Earthlies, face from face. 
Yet the Heavenlies shall surely join 
in Heaven, 
For the spirit hath no bonds in 
time or space. 

"Where it listeth, there it bloweth ; 
all existence 
Is its region ; and it houseth, 
where it will. 
I shall feel her through immeasur- 
able distance, 
And grow nearer and be gathere*' 
to her still. 



524 



THE WANDERER. 



" If I fail to find her out by lier gold 

tresses, 
Brows, and breast, and lips, and 

language of sweet strains, 
I shall know her by the traces of 

dead kisses. 
And that portion of myself which 

she retains." 

But my being is confused with new 
experience, 
And changed to something other 
than it was ; 
And the Future with the Past is set 
at variance ; 
And Life falters with the burthens 
which it lias. 

Earth's old sins press fast behind me, 
weakly wailing : 
Faint before me fleets the good I 
have not done : 
And my search for her may still be 
unavailing 
'Mid the sjiirits that are passed be- 
yond the sun. 



AT IICHNIE DUEIXG THE BALL. 

'Tis hard upon the dawn, and yet 
She conies not from the Ball. 

The night is cold, and bleak, and 
M^et, 
And the snow lies over all. 

I ])raised her with her diamonds 
on : — 
And, as she went, she smiled. 
Ami yet I sighed, when she was 
gone. 
Above our sleeping child. 

And all night long, as soft and slow- 
As falls the falling rain, 

Tlu! tlioughts of days gone long ago 
Have lilled my heart again. 

Once more I hear the Rhine rush 
down, 

(I hoar it in my mind !) 
Once more, about the sleeping town. 

The lamps wiuk in the wind. 



The narrow, silent street I pass : 
The house stands o'er the river : 

A light is at the casement-glass, 
That leads my soul forever. 

I feel my way along the gloom, 
Stair after stair, I pusli the door 

I find no change within the room, 
And all things as of yore. 

One little room was all we had 
For June and for December. 

The world is wide, but O how sad 
It seems, when I remember ! 

The cage with the canary-bird 
Hangs in the window still : 

The small red rose-tree is not stirred 
Upon the window-sill. 

Wide open her piano stands ; 

— That song I made to ease 
A passing pain while her soft hands 

Went faintly o'er the keys ! 

The fire within the stove burn* 
down ; 

The light is dying fast. 
How dear is all it shines upon, 

That firelight of the Past ! 

No sound ! the drowsy Dutch-clock 
ticks, 

O, how sliould I forget 
The .'slemler ebon crucifix, 

That by her bed is set ? 

Her little bed is white as snow, — 
How dear that little bed ! 

Sweet dreams about the curtains g:) 
And whisper roiuid her head. 

That gentle head sleeps o'er her arm 
— Sleeps all its soft brown hair : 

And those dear clothes of hers, yet 

* warm, 
Droop open on the chair. 

Yet warm the snowy petticoat 1 

The dainty corset too ! 
How warm the ribbon from hei 
throat, 

And warm each littlo shoe 1 



Lie soft, dear arm upon the pillow ! 

Sleep, foolish little head ! 
All, Aveli she sleeps ! I know the wil- 
low 

That curtains her cold bed. — 

Since last I trod that silent street 

'Tis many a year ago : 
And, if I there could set my feet 

Once more, I do not know 

If I should find it where it was, 
That house upon the river : 

But the light that lit the casement- 
glass 
I know is dark forever. 

Hark ! wheels below, . . . ray lady's 
knock ! 
— Farewell, the old romance ! — 
Well, dear, you're late, — past four 
o'clock ! — 
How often did you dance ? 

Not cooler from the crowning waltz, 
She takes my half the pillow. — 

Well, — well ! — the women free from 
faults 
Have beds below the willow ! 



AT HOME AFTER THE BALL. 

The clocks are calling Three 

Across the silent floors. 
The fire in the library 

Dies out ; through the open doors 
The red empty room you may see. 

In the nursery, up stairs. 
The child had gone to sleep. 

Half-way 'twixt dreams and prayers. 
When the hall-door made him leap 

To its thunders unawares. 

Like love in a worldly breast. 
Alone in my lady's chamber, 

Tlie lamp burns lo-sv, supprest 
'Mid satins of broidered amber, 

Where she stands, half undrest : 
15 



Her bosom all unlaced : 

Her cheeks with a bright re d stop : 
Her long dark hair displaced, 

Down streaming, heeded not. 
From her white throat to her waist : 

She stands up her full height. 
With her ball-dress slipping down 
her. 
And her eyes as fixed and bright 
As the diamond stars that crown 
her, — 
An awful, beautiful sight. 

Beautiful, yes . . . with her hair 
So wild, and her cheeks so flusht 1 

Awful, yes . . . for there 

In her beauty she stands husht 

By the pomp of her own despair I 

And fixt there, without doubt. 
Face to face with her own sorrow 

She will stand, till, from without, 
The light of the neighboring mor- 
row 

Creeps in, and finds her out. 

With last night's music pealing 
Youth's dirges in her ears : 

With last night's lamps revealing. 
In the charnels of old years. 

The face of each dead feeling. 

Ay, Madam, here alone 

You may think, till yom* heart is 
broken. 
Of the love that is dead and done, 

Of the days that, with no token, 
Forevermore are gone. — 

Weep if you can, beseech you ! 

There's no one by to curb you : 
Your child's cry cannot reach you : 

Your lord will not disturb you : 
Weep ! . . . what can weeping teach 
you ? 

Yom* tears are dead in you. 

"What harm, where all things 
change," 
You say, " if we change too ? 

— The old still suunny Grange 1 
Ah, that's far off i' the dew. 



226 



THE WANDERER. 



" Were those not pleasant hours, 

Ere I was what I am ? 
My garden of fresh flowers ! 

My uiilk-vvhite weanHng lamb ! 
My biii^lit laburnum bowers ! 

'' The orchard Avails so trim ! 

The redbi'east in the thorn ! 
The twilight soft and dim I 

The child's heart ! eve and morn, 
So rich with thouglits of Inm!^' 

Hush ! your weanling lamb is dead: 
Your garden trodden over. 

Tliey have broken the farm she.d : 
They have buried your first lover 

With tlie grass above his head. 

Has the Past, then, so much power. 
You dare take not fiom the shelf 

That book with the dry flower. 
Lest it make you hang yourself 

For being yourself for an liour ? 

Why can't you let thought be 

For even a little while ? 
There's nought in memory 

Can bring you back the smile 
Those lips have lost. Just see. 

Here what a costly gem 

To-night in your hair you wore — 
Pearls on a diamond stem ! 

"When sweet things are no more, 
Better not think of tliem. 

Are you saved by pangs that pained 
you. 
Is there comfort in all it cost you. 
Before the world had gained you. 

Before that God had lost you, 
Or your soul had quite disdained 
you ? 

For your soul (and this is worst 
To bear, as you mcU know) 

Has been watching you, from first, 
As sadly as God could do ; 

And yourself yourself have curst. 

Talk of the flames of Hell ! 

We fuel ourselves, I conceive. 
The fire tlie Fiend lights. Well, 



Believe or disbelieve, 
We know more than we tell 1 

Surely you need repose ! 

To-morrow again — the Ball. 
And you must revive the rose 

In your cheek, to bloom for all. 
Not go ? . . . why the whole world 
goes. 

To bed ! to bed ! 'Tis sad 
To find that Fancy's wings 

Have lost the hues they had. 
In thinking of these things 

Some women have gone mad. 

AU CAFE * * *. 

A PAKTY of friends, all light-hearted 
and gay. 
At a certain French cafe', where 
everyone goes. 
Are met, in a well-cuitained warm 
cabinet, 
Overlooking a stici-i there, which 
every one knows. 

The guests are, three ladies well 
known and admired : 
One adorns the Lyrique ; one . . . 
I oft liave beheld her 
At the Vaudeville, with raptures ; 
the third lives retired 
" Dann ses meubles" . . . (we all 
know her house) . . . Kue de 
Helder. 

Besides these is a fourth ... a 
young Englishman, lately 
Presented the round of the clubs , 
in the town. 
A taciturn Anglican coldness se- 
dately 
Invests him : un thawed by Clar- 
isse, he sits down. 

But little he speaks, and but rarely 
he shares 
In the laughter around him ; his 
smiles arc but few ; 
There's a sneer in the look that his 
countenance wears 
In repose; and fatigue in the eyes' 
weary blue. 



The rest are three Frenchmen. Three 
Frenchmen (thank heaven !) 
A.re hut rarely morose, with Cham- 
pagne and Bordeaux : 
And their wit, and their kiughter, 
suffices to leaven 
With mirth tlieir mute guest's im- 
itation of snow. 

The dinner is done : the Lafitte in 
its baslvet, 
Tlie Champagne in its cooler, is 
passed in gay haste ; 
Whatever you wish for, you have but 
to ask it : 
Here are coffee, cigars, and li- 
queurs to your taste. 

And forth from tlie bottles the corks 
fly; and cliilly, 
The bright wine, in bubbling and 
blushing, confounds 
Its warmth with the ice that it 
seethes round ; and shrilly 
(Till stifled by kisses) the laughter 
resounds. 

Strike, strike the piano, beat loud at 
the wall ! 
Let wealthy old Lycus with jeal- 
ousy groan 
Next door, while fair Chloris responds 
to the call. 
Too fair to be supping with Lycus 
alone ! * 

Clarisse, with a smile, has subsided, 
opprest. 
Half, perhaps, by Champagne . . . 
half, perhaps, by affection, — 
In the arms of the taciturn, cold, 
English guest. 
With, just rising athwart her im- 
perial complexion, 

One tinge that yoimg Evian himself 
have kist 
From the fairest of Maenads that 
danced in his troop ; 

• "Audeat invidus 

Dementem strepitum Lycus 
Et Ticina seni uon habiUs liyco." 

Ho&ACB. 



And her deep hair, unloosed from its 
sumptuous twist, 
Overshowering her throat and her 
bosom a-droop. 

The soft snowy throat, and the 
round, dimpled chin. 
Upturned from the arm-fold where 
hangs the rich head ! 
And the warm lips apart, while the 
w^hite lips begin 
To close over the dark languid eyes 
which they shade ! 

And next to Clarisse (witli her wild 
hair all wet 
From the wine, in whose blush its 
faint fire-fly gold 
She was steeping just now), the blue- 
eyed Juliette 
Is murmuring her witty bad things 
to Arnold. 

Cries Arnold to the dumb English 
guest ..." Mon ami, 
What's the matter ? . , . you can't 
sing . . . well, speak, then, at 
least : 
More grave, had a man seen a ghost, 
could he be ? 
Mais quel drole de farceur ! . . 
comme il a le vin triste ! " 

And says Charles to Eugene (vainly 
seeking to borrow 
Ideas from a yawn . . . "At the 
club there are tliree of us 
With the Duke, and we play lans 
quenet till to-morrow : 
I am off on the spur . . . what 
say you ? . , . will you be of 
us?" 

"Mon enfant, tu me boudes — tu me 
boudes, cheri," 
Sighs the soft Celestine on the 
breast of Eugene ; 
" Ah bah ! ne mefais pas poser, mon 
amie," 
Laughs her lover, and lifts to his 
lips — the Champagne. 



And loud from the bottles the corks 
fly ; and chilly 
The wine gurgles up to its fine 
crystal bounds. 
While Charles rolls his paper cigars 
round, how shrilly 
(Till kist out) the laughter of Juli- 
ette resounds ! 

Strike, strike the piano! beat loud at 
the wall ! 
Let wealthy old Lycus with jeal- 
ousy groan 
Next door, while fair Chloris responds 
to the call, 
Too fair to be supping with Lycus 
alone. 

There is Celestine singing, and Eu- 
gene is swearing. — 
la. the midst of the laughter, the 
oaths, and the songs, 
Falls a knock at the door ; but 
there's nobody hearing : 
Each, uninterrupted, the revel pro- 
longs. 

Said I . . . "nobody hearing?" one 
only ; — the guest. 
The morose English stranger, so 
dull to the charms 
Of Clarisse, and Juliette, Celestine, 
and the rest ; 
Who sits, cold as a stone, with a 
girl in his arms. 

Once, twice, and three times, he has 
heard it repeated ; 
And louder, and fiercer, each time 
the somid falls. 
And his cheek is death pale, 'mid 
the others so heated ; 
There's a step at the dooi', too, his 
fancy recalls. 

And he rises . . . (just so an automa- 
ton rises, — 
Some man of mechanics made 
up, — that must move 
tn the way that the wheel moves 
within him ; — there lies his 
Sole path fixt before him, below 
and above). 



He rises . . . and, scarcely a glance 
casting on her. 
Flings from hiiu the beauty asleep 
on his shoulder ; 
Charles si^rings to his feet ; Eugene 
mutters of honor ; 
But there's that in the stranger 
that awes each beholder. 

For the hue on his cheek, it is whiter 
than whiteness : 
The hair creeps on his head like a 
strange living thing. 
The lamp o'er the table has lost half 
its brightness ; 
Juliette cannot laugh ; Celestine 
cannot sing. 

He has opened the door in a silence 
unbroken : 
And the gaze of all eyes where he 
stands is fixt wholly : 
JSTot a hand is there raised ; not a 
word is there spoken : 
He has opened the door ; . . . and 
there comes through it slowly 

A woman, as pale as a dame on a 
tombstone. 
With desolate violet eyes, open 
wide : 
Her look, as she turns it, turns all 
in the room stone : 
She sits down on the sofa, the 
stranger beside. 

Her hair it is yellow, as moonlight 
on water 
Wliich stones in some eddy tor- 
ment into waves ; 
Her lips are as red as new blood spilt 
in slaughter ; ** 

Her cheek like a ghost's seen by 
night o'er the graves. 

Her place by the taciturn guest she 
has taken ; 
And the glass at her side she has 
filled with Champagne. 
As she bows o'er the board, all the 
revellers awaken. 
She has pledged her mute friend 
and she fills up again. 



IN FRANCE. 



22'9 



i 



Clarisse lias awaked ; and witli 
shrieks leaves the table. 
Juliette wakes, and faints in the 
arms of Arnold. 
And Charles and Eugene, with what 
speed they are able. 
Are off to the club, where this tale 
shall be told. 

Celestine for her brougham, on the 
stairs, was appealing. 
With hysterical sobs, to the surly 
concierge. 
When a ray through the doorway 
stole to her, revealing 
A sight that soon changed her ap- 
peal to "jLa vierge." 

All the light-hearted friends from 
the chamber are fled : • 
And the cafe' itself has grown si- 
lent by this. 
From the dark street below, you can 
scarce hear a tread, 
Save the Gendarme's, who reigns 
there as gloomy as Dis. 

The shadow of night is beginning to 
flit: 
Through the gray window shim- 
mers the motionless town. 
The ghost and the stranger, together 
they sit 
Side by side at the table — the place 
is their own. 

They nod and change glances, that 
pale man and woman ; 
For they both are well known to 
each other : and then 
Some ghosts have a look that's so 
horribly human. 
In the street you might meet them, 
and take them for men. 

" Thou art changed, my beloved ! and 
the lines have grown stronger. 
And the cm-Is have grown scauter, 
that meet on thy brow. 
Ah, faithless ! and dost thou remem- 
ber no longer 
The hour of our passion, the words 
pf thy vow ? 



"Thy kiss, on my lips it is burning 
forever I 
I cannot sleep calm, for my bed is 
so cold. 
Embrace me ! close . . . closer . . . O 
let us part never, 
And let all be again as it once wa.s 
of old!" 

So she murmurs repiuingly ever. 
Her breath 
Lifts his hair like a night-wind in 
winter. And he . . . 
" Thy hand, O Irene, is icy as death, 
But thy face is unchanged in its 
beauty to me." 

" 'Tis so cold, my beloved one, down 
there, and so drear." 
''Ah, thy sweet voice, Irene, 
sounds hollow and strange I " 
"'Tis. the chills of the grave that 
have changed it, I fear : 
But the voice of my heart there's 
no chill that can change." 

"Ha ! thy pale cheek is flusht with 
a heat like my own. 
Is it breath, is it flame, on thy 
lips that is burning ? 
Ha ! thy heart flutters wild, as of 
■old, 'neath thy zone. 
And those cold eyes of thine fill 
with passionate yearning." 

Thus, embracing each other, they 
bend and they waver, 
And, laitghing and weeping, con- 
verse. The pale ghost. 
As the wine warms the grave-worm 
within her, grown braver, 
Fills her glass to the brim, and 
]3roposes a toast. 

" Here's a health to the glow-worm, 
Death's sober lamplighter, 
That saves from the darkness be- 
low the gravestone 
The tomb's pallid pictures . . • the 
sadder the brighter ; 
Shapes of beavity each stony-eyed 
corpse there hath known ; 



230 



THE WANDERER. 



" Mere rough sketches of life, where 
a glimpse goes for all, 
Which the Master keeps (all the 
rest let the world have !) 
But though only rough-scrawled on 
the blank charnel wall, 
Is their truth the less sharp, that 
'tis sheathed in the grave ? 

" Here's to Love . . . the prime pas- 
sion . . . the harp that we 
sung to 
In the orient of youth, in the days 
pure of pain ; 
The cup that we quaffed in : the 
stirrup we sprung to, 
So light, ere the journey was 
made — and in vain ! 

" O the life that we liyed once ! the 
beauty so fair once ! 
Let them go ! wherefore weep for 
what tears could not save ? 
What old trick sets us aping the 
fools that we were once. 
And tickles our brains even under 
the grave ? 

"There's a small stinging worm 
which the grave ever breeds 
From the folds of the shroud that 
around us is spread : 
There's a little blind maggot that 
revels and feeds 
On the life of the living, the sleep 
of the dead. 

"To our friends! ..." But the 
full flood of dawn through the 
pane. 
Having slowly rolled down the 
huge street there unheard 
(Wliile the groat, new, blue sky, o'er 
the white Madeleine 
Was wide opening itself), from her 
lip washed the word ; 

Washed her face faint and fainter ; 
wliile, dimmer and dimmer, 
In its seat, the. pale form flickered 
out like a flame, 



As broader, and brighter, and fuller, 
the glimmer 
Of day through the heat-clouded 
window became. 

And the day mounts apace. Some 
one opens the door. 
In shuftles a waiter with sleepy 
red eyes : 
He stares at the cushions flung loose 
on the floor. 
On the bottles, the glasses, the 
plates, with surprise. 

Stranger still ! he sees seated a man 
at the table, 
AVith his head on his hands : in a 
slumber he seems, . 
So wild, and so strange, he no longer 
is able 
In silence to thrid through the 
path of his dreams. 

For he moans, and he mutters : he 
moves and he motions : 
To the dream that he dreams o'er 
his wine-cup he pledges. 
And his sighs sound, tlirough sleep, 
like spent M'inds over ocean's 
Last verge, where the world hides 
its outermost edges. 

The gas-lamp falls sick in the tube : 
and so, dying, 
To the fumes of spilt wine, and 
cigars but half smoked. 
Adds the stench of its last gasp : 
chairs broken are lying 
All about o'er the carpet stained, 
littered, and soaked. 

A touch starts the sleeper. He 
wakes. It is day. 
And the beam that dispels all the 
phantoms of night 
Through the rooms sends its kindly 
and comforting ray : 
The streets are new-peopled : the 
morning is bright. 



IN FRANCE. 



231 



And the city's so fair ! and the dawn 
breaks so brightly ! 
With gay flowers in the market, 
gay girls in the street. 
Whate'er the strange beings that 
visit us nightly, 
When Paris "awakes, from her 
smile they retreat. 

I myself have, at morning, beheld 
them departing ; 
Some in masks, and in dominos, 
foothig it on ; 
Some like imps, some like fairies ; 
at cockcrow all starting. 
And speedily flitting from sight 
one by one. 

And that wonderful night-flower. 
Memory, that, tearful. 
Unbosoms to darkness her heart 
full of dew. 
Folds her leaves round again, and 
from day shrinks up fearful 
In the cleft of her ruin, the shade 
of her yew. 

This broad daylight life's strange 
enoiigli : and wherever 
We wander, or walk ; in the club, 
in the streets ; 
Not a straw on the ground is too 
trivial to sever 
Each man in the crowd from tlie 
others he meets. 

Each walks with a spy or a jailer be- 
hind him 
(Some word he has spoken, some 
deed he has done) : 
And the step, now and then, quick- 
ens, just to remind him, 
In the crowd, in the sun, that he 
is not alone. 

But 'tis hard, when by lamplight, 
'mid laughter and songs too. 
Those return, ... we have bm-ied, 
and mourned for, and prayed 
for. 
And done with . . . and, free of the 
grave it belongs to, 
Some ghost drinks your health in 
the wine you have paid for. 



Wreathe the rose, O Young Man ; 
pour the wine. What thou hast 
That enjoy all the days of thy 
youth. Spare thou naught. 
Yet beware ! ... at the boarcb sits a 
ghost — 'tis the Past ; 
In thy heart lurks a weird necro- 
mancer — 'tis Thought. 



THE CHESS-BOAKD. 

My little love, do you remember, 

Ere we were grown so sadly wise, 
Those evenings in the bleak Decem- 
ber, 
Curtained warm from the snowy 

weather. 
When you and I played chess to- 
gether, 
Checkmated by each other's eyes ? 
Ah, still I see your soft white hand 
Hovering warm o'er Queen and 
Knight. 
Bi'ave Pawns in valiant battle 
siaiul. 
The doulile Castles guard the wings : 
The Bishop, bent on distant things, 
Moves, sidling through the fight. 
Our fingers touch ; our glances 

meet, 
And falter ; falls your golden hair 
Against my cheek ; your bosom 
sweet 
Is .heaving. Down the field, your 

Queen 
Rides slow her soldiery all between, 
And checks me unaware. 
Ah me ! the little battle's done, 
Disperst is all its chivalry ; 
Full many a move, since then, have 

we 
'Mid Life's perplexing checkers 

made. 
And many a game with Fortune 
played, — 
What is it we have won ? 
This, this at least — if this alone ; — 
That never, never, never more. 
As in those old still nights of yore 
(Ere we were grown so sadly wise), 



232 



THE WANDERER. 



Can you and I stut out the skies, 
Shut out the world, and wintry 
weather. 
And, eyes exchanging warmth with 
eyes. 
Play chess, as then we played, to- 
gether 1 

SONG. 

If Sorrow have taught me anything, 

She hath taught me to weep for 
you ; 
And if Falsehood have left me a tear 
to shed 

For Truth, these tears are true. 
If the one star left by the morning 

Be dear to the dying night, 
If the late lone rose of October 

Be sweetest to scent and sight. 
If the last of the leaves in December 

Be dear to the desolate tree, 
Remember, beloved, O remember 

How dear is your beauty to me ! 

And more dear than the gold, is the 
silver 
Grief hath sown in that hair's 
young gold : 
And lovelier than youth is the lan- 
guage 
Of the thoughts that have made 
youth old ; 
"We must love, and unlove, and for- 
get, dear — 
Fashion and shatter the spell 
Of how many a love in a life, dear — 
Ere life learns to love once and 
love well. 
Then what matters it, yesterday's 
sorrow ? 
Since I have outlived it — see ! 
And what matter the cares of to- 
morrow, 
Since you, dear, will share them 
with me ? 

To love it is hard, and 'tis harder 

Perchance to be loved again : 
3ut you'll love me, I know, now I 
iove you^ — 



What I seek I am patient to gain. 
To the tears I have shed, and regret 
not. 
What matter a few more tears ? 
Or a few days' waiting longer, 

To one that has waited for years ? 
Hush ! lay your head on my breast, 
there. 
Not a word ! . . . while I weep for 
your sake. 
Sleep, and forget me, and rest there : 
My heart will wait warm till you 
wake. 
For — if Sorrow have taught me any- 
thing [you ; 
She hath taught me to weep for 
And if Falsehood have left me a tear 
to shed 
For Truth, these tears are true ! 

THE LAST REMONSTRANCE. 

Yes ! I am worse than thou didst 
once believe me. 
Worse than thou deem'st me now 
I cannot be — 
But say "the Fiend's no blacker," 
.'. . canst thou leave me ? 
Where wilt thou flee ? 

Where wilt thou bear the relics of 
the days 
Squandered round this dethroned 
love of thine '? 
Hast thou the silver and the gold to 
raise 
A new God's shrine ? 

Thy cheek hath lost its roundness 
and its bloom : 
Who will forgive those signs where 
tears have fed 
On thy once lustrous eyes, — save he 
for whom 
Those tears were shed ? 

Know I not every grief whose course 
hath sown 
Lines on thy brow, and silver in 
thy hair ? 
Will new love learn the language, 
mine alone 
Hath graven there ? 



IN FRANCE. 



233 , 



Despite the blemisht beauty of tliy 
brow, 
Thou wouldst be lovely, couldst 
thou love again ; 
For Love renews the Beautiful : but 
thou 
Hast only pain. 

How wilt thou bear from pity to im- 
plore 
What once those eyes from raptui'e 
could command ? 
How wilt thou stretch — who wast a 
Queen of yore — 
A suppliant's hand ? 

Even were thy heart content from 
love to ask 
No more than needs to keep it 
from the chill, 
Hast thou the strength to recom- 
mence the task 
Of pardoning still ? 

Wilt thou to one, exacting all that I 
Have lost the right to ask for, still 
extend 
Forgiveness on forgiveness, with that 
sigh 
That dreads the end ? 

Ah, if thy heart can pardon yet, why 

yet 

Should not its latest pardon be for 

me? 
For who will bend, the boon he seeks 

to get, 
On lowlier knee ? 

Where wilt thou find the unworthier 
heart than mine, 
That it may be more grateful, or 
more lowly ? 
To whom else, pardoning much, be- 
come divine 
By pardoning wholly ? 

Hath not thy forehead paled beneath 
my kiss ? 
And through thy life have I not 
writ my name ? 
Hath not my soul signed thine ? . . , 
I gave thee bliss. 
If I gave shame : 



The shame, but not the bliss, 
where'er thou goest. 
Will haunt thee yet : to me no 
shame thon hast : 
To me alone, what noAV thou art, ', 
thou knowest 
By what thou wast. 

Wliat other hand will help thy heart 
to swell 
To raptures mine first taught it 
how to feel ? 
Or from the unchorded harj) and va- 
cant shell 
New notes reveal ? 

Ah, by my dark and sullen nature 
. nurst. 

And rocked by passion on this , 
stormy heart, i 

Be mine the last, as thou wert mine ' 
tlie first ! 
We dare not part ! 

At best a fallen Angel to mankind, 
To me be still the seraph I have 
dared 
To show my hell to, and whose love 
resigned 
Its pain hath shared. ' 

If, faring on together, I have fed 

Thy lips on poisons, they were 

sweet at least, \ 

Nor couldst thou thrive where ho- | 

lier Love hath spread i 

His simpler feast. i 

Change would be death. Could sev- 1 

erance from my side | 

Bring thee repose, I would not ; 

bid thee stay. ; 

My love should meet, as calmly as > 

my pride, ; 

That parting day. 

It may not be : for thou couldst not 
forget me, — 
Not that my own is more than 
other natures, 
But that 'tis different : and tho» 
wouldst regi'et me 
'Mid purer creatiires. 



234 



THE WANDERER. 



Then, if lore's first ideal now grows 
wan, 
And thou wilt love again, — again 
love me. 
For what I am : — no hero, but a man 
Still loving thee. 



SOECERY. 



You're a milk-white Panther : 

I'm a Genius of the air. 
You're a Princess once enchanted ; 

That is why you seem so fair. 

For a crime untold, unwritten. 
That was done an age ago, 

I have lost my wings, and wander 
In the wilderness below. 

In a dream too long indulged. 

In a Palace by the sea. 
You were changed to what you are 

By a muttered sorcery. 

Your name came on my lips 

When I first looked in your eyes : 

At my feet you fawned, you knew 
me 
In despite of all disguise. 

The black elephants of Delhi 
Are the wisest of their kind. 

And the libbards of Soumatra 
Are full of eyes behind : 

But they guessed not, they divined 
not, 
Tliey believed me of the earth, 
Wlien I walked among them, mourn- 
ing 
For tlie region of ray birth. 

Till I found you in the moonlight. 

Then at once I knew it all. 
You were sleeping in the sand here. 

But you wakened to my call. 

I knew why, in your slumber. 
You were moaning piteously : 

You heard a sound of harping ' 
From a Palace by the sea. 



Through tlie wilderness together 
We must wander everywhere, 

Till we find the magic berry 
That shall make us what we were. 

'Tis a berry sweet and bitter, 
I have heard ; there is but one ; 

On a tall tree, by a fountain, 
In the desert all alone. 

Wlien at last 'tis found and eaten. 
We shall both be what we were ; 

You, a Princess of the water, 
I, a Genius of the air. 

See ! tlie Occident is flaring 
Far behind us in the skies, 

And our shadows float before us. 
Niglit is coming forth. Arise ! 



ADIEU, MIGNONNE, MA 
BELLE. 

Adieu, Mignonne, ma belle . 
when you are gone. 
Vague thoughts of you will wan- 
der, searching love 
Througli this dim heart : tlrrough 
this dim rooni, Mignonne, 
Vague fragrance from your hair 
and dress will move. 

How will you think of this poor 
heart to-morrow. 
Tills poor fond heart with all its 
joy in you ? 
Which you were fain to lean on, 
once, in sorrow, 
Though now you bid it such a 
light adieu. 

You'll sing perchance . . . "I passed 
a night of dreams 
Once, in an old inn's old worm- 
eaten bed, 
Passing on life's highway. How 
strange it seems. 
That never more I there shall lean 
my head ! " 



IN FRANCE. 



235 



Adieu, Mignonne, adieu, Mignonne, 
ma belle ! 
Ah, little witch, our greeting was 
so gay, 
Our love so painless, who'd have 
thought " Farewell " 
Could ever be so sad a word to 
say? 

I leave a thousand fond farewells 
with you : 
Some for yoiu* red wet lips, which 
were so sweet : 
Some for your darling eyes, so dear, 
so blue : 
Some for yom* wicked, wanton 
little feet : 

But for yoru" little heart, not yet 
awake, — 
What can I leave your little heart, 
Mignonne ? 
It seems so fast asleep, I fear to 
break 
The poor thing's slumber. Let it 
still sleep on ! 



TO MIGNONNE. 

At morning, from the sunlight 
I shall miss yoiu- sunny face, 

Leaning, laughing, on my shoulder 
With its careless infant grace ; 
And your hand there, 

With its rosy, inside color, 
And the sparkle of its rings ; 

And your soul from this old chamber 
Missed in fifty little tlungs, 
Wlien I stand there. 

And the roses in the garden 
Droop stupid all the day, — 

Red, thirsty mouths wide open. 
With not a word to say ! 

I Their last meaning 

Is all faded, like a fragrance, 

From the languishing late flowers, 
With your feet, yom- slow white 
movements, 
And your face, in silent hours. 
O'er them leaning. 



And, in long, cool summer evenings, 
I shall never see you, drest 

In those pale violet colors 
Which suit your sweet face best. 
Here's your glove, child. 

Soiled and empty, as you left it. 
Yet your hand's warmth seems to 
stay 
In it still, as though this moment 
You had drawn your hand away ; 
Like your love, child, 

Which still stays about my fancy. 

See this little, silken boot. — 
What a plaything ! was there ever 

Such a slight and slender foot ? 
Is it strange now 

How that, when your lips are nearest 
To the lips they feed upon 

For a summer time, till bees sleep, 
On a sudden you are gone ? 
What new change now 

Sets you sighing . - . eyes uplifted 

To the starry night above ? 
"God is great . . . the soul's im- 
mortal ... 
Must we die, thoiigh ! ... Do you 
love ? 
One kiss more, then : 

"Life might end now !" . . . And 
next moment 
With those wicked little feet. 
You have vanished, — like a Fairy 
From a fountain in tlie heat, 
And all's o'er, then. 

Well, no matter ! . . . hearts are 
breaking 
Every day, but not for you, 
Little wanton, ever making 
Chains of rose, to break them 
through. 
I would mourn you. 

But your red smile was too warm, 
Sweet, 
And your little heart too cold, 
And your blue eyes too blue merely, 
For a strong, sad man to scold, 
^Veep, or scorn, you. 



siii, 



236 



THE WANDERER. 



For that smile's soft, transient sun- 
shine 
At my liearth, when it was chill, 
I shall never do yonr name wrong. 
But think kindly of you still ; 
And each moment 

Of yoiu- pretty infant angers, 

(Who could heliJ but smile at . . . 
when 
Those small feet would stamp our 
love out ?) 
"Wliy, I pass them now, as then, 
Without comment. 

Only, here, when I am searching 
For the book I cannot find, 

I must sometimes i^ass your boudoir, 
Howsoever disinclined ; 

And must meet there 

The gold bird-cage in the window, 

Wliere no bird is singing now ; 
The small sofa and the footstool. 
Where I miss ... I know not 
how . . . 

Your young feet there. 

Silken-soft in each quaint slipper ; 

And the jewelled writing-case. 
Where you never more will write 
now ; 
And the vision of your face. 
Just turned to me : — 

I would save this, if I could, child, 
But that's all. . . . September's 
here ! 
I must write a book : read twenty : 
Learn a language . . . what's to 
fear? 
Who grows gloomy 
Being free to work, as I am ? 

Yet these autumn niglits are cold. 
How I wonder how you'll pass them ! 
Ah, . . . could all be as of old ! 
But 'tis best so. 

All good things must go for better, 

As the primrose for the rose. 
Is love free ? why so is life, too ! 
Holds the grave fast ? . . . I sup- 
pose 
Things must rest so. 



GOMPENSATION. 

WnEX the days are silent all 
Tin the drear light falls ; 

And the nights pass with the pall 
Of Love's funerals ; 

When the heart is weiglied with 
years ; 

And the eyes too weak for tears ; 

And life like death appears ; 

Is it naught, O soul of mine, 
To hear i' the windy track 
A voice with a song divine 

Calling thy footsteps back 
To the land thou lovest best. 
Toward the Garden in the West 
Where thou hast once been blest ? 

Is it naught, O aching brow, 

To feel in the dark liour, 
Which came, though called, so slow, 

And, though loathed, yet lingers 
slower, 
A hand upon thy pain. 
Lovingly laid again, 
Smoothing the ruffled brain ? 

O love, my own and only ! 

The seraphs shall not see 
By my looks that life was lonely ; 

But that 'twas blest by thee. 
If few lives have been more lone 
Few have more rapture known, 
Than mine and thine, my own ! 

When the lamp burns dim and dim- 
mer ; 

And the curtain close is drawn ; 
And the twilight seems to glimmer 

With a supernatural dawn ; 
And the Genius at the door 
Turns the torch down to the floor, 
Till the world is seen no more ; 

In the doubt, the dark, the fear, 

'Mid the spirits come to take thee, 
Shall mine to thine be near. 

And my kiss the first to wake 
thee. 
Meanwhile, in life's December, 
On the wind that strews tlie ember, 
Shall a voice still moan ..." Ke.' 
member I" 



m FHANCB. 



237 



Translations from peter 

RONSARD. 

" VOICILE BOIS QUE MA SAINCTE 
ANGELETTE." 

Here is the wood that freshened to 
her song ; 
See here, the flowers that keep her 

footprints yet ; 
Where, all alone, my saintly 
Aiigelette 
Went wandering, with her maiden 
thoughts, along. 

Here is the little rivulet where she 
stopped; 
And here the greenness of the 

grass shows where 
She lingered through it, searching 
here and there 
Those daisies dear, T\-hicli in her 
breast she dropped. 

Here did she sing, and here she 

wept, and here 
Her smile came back ; and here I 

seem to hear 
Those faint half-words with which 

my thoughts are rife ; 
Here did she sit ; here, childlike, 

did she dance. 
To some vague impulse of»lier own 

romance — 
Ah, Love, on all these thoughts, 

winds out my life ! 

" CACHE POUR CETTE NUICT." 

Hide, for a night, thy horn, good 
^Nloon ! Fair Fortune 
For this shall keep Endymion ever 

prest 
Deep-dreaming, amorous, on thine 
argent breast, 
Nor ever shall enchanter thee impor- 
tune. 

Hateful to me the day ; most sweet 
the night ! 
I fear the myriad meddling eyes of 
day; 



But courage comes with night. 
Close, close, I pray, 
Your curtains, dear dark skies, on 
my delight ! 

Thou too, thou Moon, thou too hast 

felt love's power ! 
Pan, with a white fleece, won thee 

for an hour ; 
And you, sidereal Signs in yonder 

blue, 

Favor the fire to which my heart is 

moved. 
Forget not. Signs, the greater part 

of you 
Was only set in heaven for having 

loved ! 



"PAGE,SUT MOY." 

Follow, my Page, where the green 
grass embosoms 
The enamelled Season's freshest- 
fallen dew ; 
Then home, and my still' house 
with handfiils strew 
Of frail-lived April's newliest nur- 
tured blossoms. 

Take from the wall now, my soug- 
tune'd Lyre ; 
Here will I sit and charm out the 

sweet pain 
Of a dark eye whose light hath 
burned my bi-ain, 
The unloving loveliness of my desire ! 

And here my ink, and here my 

papers, place : — 
A hundred leaves of white, whereon 

to trace 
A hundred words of desultory 

woe — 
Words which shall last, like graven 

diamonds, sure ; — 
That, some day hence, a future 

race may know 
And ponder on the pain which I 

endure. . 



+ 



THE WANDERER. 



" LES ESPICES SONT A CERES:' 

Ceres hath her harvest sweet : 
Clilora's is the young gi-een grass : 

Woods tor Fauns with cloven feet : 
His green laurel Phoebus has : 

Minerva has her Olive-tree : 

And the Pine's for Cybele. 

Sweet sounds are for Zephyr's wings : 
Sweet fruit for Pomona's bosom : 

For the Nymphs are crystal springs 
And for Flora bud and blossom : 

But sighs and tears, and sad ideas, 

These alone are Cytherea's. 

'^MA DOUCE JOUVENCE," 

My sweet youth nowjs all done ; 
The strength and the beauty are 

gone. 
The tooth now is black, and the 

head now is white, 
And the nerves now are loosed : in 

the veins 
Only water (not blood now) remains. 
Where the pulse beat of old with 

delight. 



Adieu, O my lyre, O adieu. 

You sweet women, my lost loves, 

and you 
Each dead passion ! . . , The end 

creepeth nigher. 
Not one pastime of youth has kept 

pace 
With my age. Naught remains io 

their place 
But the bed, and the cup, and the 

fire. 

My head is confused with low fears, 
And sickness, and too many years ; 

Some care in each corner I meet — 
And, wherever I linger or go, 
I turn back, and loolc after, to know 

If the Death be still dogging my 
feet : — 

Dogging me down the dark stair, 
Which windeth, I cannot tell where, 

To some Pluto that opens foi*ever 
His cave to all comers — Alas ! 
How easily down it all pass. 

And return, from it — never, ah, 
never ! 



BOOK III. — IN ENGLAND. 



THE ALOE. 

A STKANGEK Sent from burning 
lands, 
In realms where buzz and mutter 
yet 
Old gods, Avith hundred heads and 
hands. 
On jewelled thrones of jet, — 

(Old gods as old as Time itself,) 
And, in a hot and level calm, 

Recline o'er many a sandy shelf 
Dusk forms beneath the palm, — 

To Lady Eve, who dwells beside 
The river-meads, and oak-trees 
tall, 



Wliose dewy shades encircle wide 
Her old Baronial Hall, 

An Indian plant with leaves like 
horn, 
And, all along its stubborn spine. 
Mere humps, with angry spike and 
thorn 
Armed like the porcupine. 

In" midst of which one sullen bud 
Surveyed the world, with head 
aslant. 
High-throned, and looking like the 
god 
Of this strange Indian plant. 



A 



IN ENGLAND. 



239 



A stubborn plant, from looking cross 
It seemed no kindness could re- 
trieve ! 

But for his sake whose gift it was 
It pleased the Lady Eve. 

She set it on the terraced vi^alk, 
Within her own fair garden- 
ground ; 

And every morn and eve its stalk 
Was duly Avatered roimd. 

And every eve and morn, the while 
- She tended this uncourteous thing, 
I stood beside her, — watched her 
smile. 
And often heai'd lier sing. 

The roses I at times would twist 
To deck her hair, she oft forgot ; 

But never that dark aloe missed 
The daily watering-pot. 

She seemed so gay, — I felt so sad, — 
Her laugh but made me frown tlie 
more : 

For each light word of hers I had 
Some sharjj reply in store. 

Until she laughed . . . "This aloe 
shows 
A kindlier nature than your 
own" . . . 
Ah, Eve, you little dreamed what 

foes 
^ The plant and I had grown ! 

At last, one summer night, when all 
The garden-flowers were dreaming 
still, 

And still the old Baronial Hall, 
The oak-trees on the hill, 

A loud and sudden sound there 
stirred, 

As when a thunder-cloud is torn ; 
Such thunder-claps are only heard 

When little gods are born. 

The echo went from place to place, 
And wakened every early sleeper. 

Some said that poachers in the chase 
Had slain a buck — or keeper. 



Some hinted burglars at the door : 
Some questioned if it had not 
liglitened : 
While all the maids, as each one 
swore. 
From their seveii wits were fright- 
ened. 

The peacocks screamed, and every 
rook 
Upon the elms at roost did caw : 
Each inmate straight the house for- 
sook : 
They searched — and, last, — they 
saw 

That sullen bud to flower had burst 
Upon the sharp - leaved aloe 
there ; — 
A wondrous flower, whose breath 
disperst 
Rich odors on the air. 

A flower, colossal — dazzling white, 
And fair as is a Sphinx's face. 

Turned broadly to the moon by night 
From some vast temple's base. 

Yes, Eve ! your aloe paid the pains 
With which its sullen growth you 
nursi. 

But ah ! my nature yet remains 
As churlish as at first. 

And yet, and yet — it might have 
proved 
Not all unworth your heart's ap- 
proving. 
Ah, had I only been beloved, — 
(Beloved as I was loving !) 

I might have been . . , how much, 
how much, 

I am not now, and shall not be! 
One gentle look, one tender touch, 

Had done so much for me ! 

I too, perchance, if kindly tended, 
Had roused the napping genera- 
tion. 
With something novel, strange, and 
splendid, 
Deserving admiration : 



240 



THE WANDERER. 



For all the wliile there grew, and 
grew 
A germ, — a bud, within my bo- 
som : 
No flower, fair Eve ! — for, thanks to 
you, 
It never came to blossom. 

"MEDIO DE FONTE LEPO- 
KUM SUEGIT AMARI ALI- 
QUID." 

LUCKETIUS. 

We walked about at Hampton 
Court, 
Alone in sunny weather, 
And talked — half earnest, and half 
sport, 
Linked arm in arm together. 

I pressed her hand upon the steps. 

Its warmest light the sky lent. 
She sought the shade : I sought her 
lips : 

We kissed : and then were silent. 

Clare thought, no doubt, of many 
things, 

Besides the kiss I stole there ; — 
The sun, in sunny founts in rings, 

The bliss of soul with soul there. 

The bonnet, fresh from France, she 
woi-e, 

My pi-aise of how she wore it. 
The arms above the carven door, 

The orange- trees before it ; — 

But I could only think, as, mute 
I watched her happy snule there, 

With rising pain, of this curst boot, 
That pinched me all the while 
there, 

THE DEATH OF KING HACON. 

It was Odin that whispered in Vin- 
golf, 
"Go forth to the heath by the 
sea ; 
Find Hacon before the moon rises, 
And bid him to supper with me." 



They go forth to choose from the 
Princes 
Of Yngvon, and summons from 
light 
A man who must perish in battle, 
And sup where the gods sup to- 
night. 

Leaning over her brazen spear, Gon- 
dula 
Thus bespake her companions, 
" The feast 
Of the gods shall, in Vingolf, this 
evening, 
O ye Daughters of War, be in- 
creast. 

"For Odin hath beckoned unto me, 
For Odin hath whispered nie forth, 

To bid to his supper King TIacon 
With the half of the hosts of the 
North." 

Their horses gleamed white through 
the vapor : 
In the moonlight their corselets 
did shine : 
As they wavered and whispered to- 
gether. 
And fashioned their solemn de- 
sign. 

Hacon heard them discoiu-sing — 
" Wliy hast thou 
Thus disposed of the battle so 
soon ? 
O, were we not worthy of conquest ? 
Lo ! we die by the rise of the 
moon." 

" It is not the moon that is rising, 
But the glory which penetrates 
death, 
Wlien heroes to Odin are summoned: 
Rise, Hacon, and stand on the 
heath ! 

" It is we," she replied, " that have 
given 
To thy pasture the flower of the 
fight. 
It is we, it is we that have scattered 
Thine enemies yonder in flight. 



IN ENGLAND. 



241 



"Come now, let us push on our 
horses 
Over yonder green worlds in the 
east, 
Where the great gods are gathered 
together. 
And the tables are piled for the 
feast. 

"Betimes to give notice to Odin, 
Who waits in his sovran abodes, 

That the King to his palace is com- 
ing 
This evening to visit the gods." 

Odiu rose when he heard it, and 
with him 
Rose the gods, every god to his 
feet. 
- He beckoned Hermoder and Brago, 
They came to him, each from his 
seat. 

" Go forth, O my sons, to King Ha- 
con, 
And meet him and greet him from 
all, 
A King that we know by liis valor 
Is coming to-night to our hall." 

Then faintly King Hacon ap- 
proaches, 
Arriving from battle, and sore 
With the wounds that yet bleed 
through his armor 
Bedabbled and dripping with gore. 

His visage is pallid and awful 
With the awe and the pallor of 
death, 
Like the moon that at midnight arises 
Where the battle lies strewn on the 
heath. 

To him spake Hermoder and Brago, 
" We meet thee and greet thee 
from all, 
To the gods thou art known by thy 
valor, 
And they bid thee a guest to their 
hall. 

16 



"Come hithei*, come hither, King 
Hacon, 
And join those eight brothers of 
thine. 
Who already, awaiting thy coming, 
With the gods in Walhala recline. 

" And loosen, O Hacon, thy corselet, 
For thy wounds are yet ghastly "to 
see. 
Go pour ale in the circle of heroes, 
And drink, for the gods drink to 
thee." 

But he answered, the hero, " I never 
Will part with the armor I wear. 

Shall a warrior stand before Odin 
Unshamed, without helmet and 
spear ? " 

Black Fenris, the wolf, the destroyer, 
Shall arise and break loose from his 
chain 

Before that a hero like Hacon 
Shall stand in the battle again. 



"CARPE DIEM." 

Horace. 

To-morrow is a day too far 
To trust, whatever the day be. 

We know, a little, what we are, 
But who knows what he may be ? 

The oak that on the moimtain grows 

A goodly ship may be, 
Next year ; but it is as well (who 
knows ?) 

May be a gallows-tree. 

'Tis God made man, no doubt, — not 
Chance : 

He made us, great and small ; 
But, being made, 'tis Circumstance 

That finishes us all. 

The Author of this world's great plan 
The same results will draw 

From human life, however man 
May keep, or break, His law. 



242 



THE WANDERER. 



The Artist to his Art doth loolv ; 

And Art's great laws exact 
That those portrayed in Nature's 
Book, 

Should freely move and act. 

The moral of the work unchanged 

Endures eternally, 
Howe'er by human wills arranged 

The work's details may be. 

"Give us this day our daily bread. 
The morrow shall talce heed 

Unto itself." The Master said 
No more. No more we need. 

To-morrow cannot make or mar 
To-day, whate'er the day be : 

Nor can the men which now we are 
Foresee the men we may be. 

THE FOUNT OF TRUTH. 

^It was the place by legends told. 

I read the tale when yet a child. 
The castle on the mountain hold. 
The \foodland in the wild. 

The wrecks of unremembered days 
Were heaped around. It was the 
hour 
When bold men fear, and timorous 
fays 
Grow bold, and know their power. 

The month was in the downward 
year. 
The breath of A-utumn chilled the 
sky ; 
And useless leaves, too early sere, 
Muttered and eddied by. 

It seemed that I was wending back 
Among the ruins of my youth, 

Along a wild night-haunted track 
To seek the Fount of Truth. 

The Foimt of Truth, — that wondrous 
fount ! 
Its solemn sound I seem to hear 
Wind - borne adown the clouded 
mount. 
Desolate, cold, and clear. 



By clews long lost, and found again 
I know not how, my course was 
led 
Through lands remote from living 
men. 
As life is from the dead. 

Yet up that wild road, here and 
there. 
Large awful footprints did I meet: 
Footprints of gods perchance they 
were, 
Prints — not of human feet. 

The mandrake underneath my foot 
Gave forth a shriek of angry pain. 

I heard the roar of some wild brute 
Prowling the windy plain. 

I reached the gate. I blew with 
power 
A blast upon the darkness wide. 
" Who art thou ? " from the gloomy 
tower 
The suUei; warder cried. 

" A Pilgrim to the Fount of Truth." 
He laughed a laugh of scornful 
spleen. 
"Art thou not from the Land of 
Youth ? 
Report where thou hast been." 

" The Land of Youth ! an alien 
race 
There, in my old dominions, 
reign ; 
And, with them, o]^ in whose false 
face 
I will not gaze again. 

" From to and fro the world I come, 
Where I have fared as exiles fare, 

Mocked by the memories of home 
And homeless everywhere. 

" The snake that slid through 
Paradise 
Yet on my pathway slides and 
slips : 
The apple plucked in Eden twice 
Is yet upon my lips. 



IN ENGLAND. 



243 



** I can report the wprld is still 
Where ithatlibeeri since it began: 

And Wisdom, with bewildered will, 
Is still the same sick man, 

"Whom vet the self-same visions 
fool,. 
The self-same nightmares hannt 
and scare. 
Folly still breeds the Pnblic Fool, 
Knowledge increaseth care : 

" Joy hath his tears, and Grief her 
smile ; 
And still both tears and smiles de- 
ceive. 
And in the Valley of the Nile 
I hear — and I believe — 

" The Fiend and Michael, as of 
yore, 
Yet wage the ancient war : but 
how 
This strife will end at last, is more 
Than our new sages know." 

I heard the gate behind me close. 

It closed with a reluctant wail. 
Roused by the soiuid from lier re- 
pose 

Started the Porteress pale : 

In pity, or in scorn ..." Forbear, 
Madam," she cried, ..." thy 
search for Truth. 

The curl is in thy careless hair. 
Return to Love and Youth. 

"What lured thee here, through dark, 
and doubt, 
The many - perilled prize to 
win ?" — 
" The dearth" ... I said . . . " of 
all without, 
The thirst of all within. 

" Age comes not with the wrinkled 
brow 

But earlier, with the ravaged heart ; 
Full oft hatli fallen the winter snow 

Since Love from me did part. 



" Long in dry pla'ces, void of cheer. 
Long have I roamed. These 
features scan : 

If magic lore be thine, look here. 
Behold the Talisman! " 

I crossed the court. The blood- 
hound bayed 

Behind me from the outer wall. 
The drowsy grooms my call obeyed 

And lit the haunted hall. 

They brought me horse, and lance, 
and helm, 
They bound the buckler on my 
breast, 
Spread the weird chart of that wild 
realm, 
And armed me for the quest. 

Uprose the Giant of the Keep. 
"Rash fool, ride on!" . . . I 
heard him say, 
" The night is late, the heights are 
steep, 
And Truth is far away ! " 

And . . . "Faraway !" . . . the 
echoes fell 
Behind as from that grisly hold 
I turned. ]S"o tongue of man may 
tell 
What mine must leave untold. 

The Fount of Truth, — that wondrous 
fount ! 

Far off I heard its waters play. 
But ere I scaled the solemn mount, 

Dawn broke. The trivial day 

To its accustomed course flowed 
back, 

And all the glamour faded round. 
Is it forever lost, — that track ? 

Or — was it never found ? 



MIDGES. 

She is talking aesthetics, the dear 
clever creature ! 
Upon Man, and his functions, she 
speaks with a smile. 



Her ideas are divine upon Art, upon 
Nature, 
The sublime, the Heroic, and Mr. 
Carlyle. 

I no more am found worthy to join 
in the talk, now ; 
So I follow with my surreptitious 
cigar ; 
While she leads our poetical friend 
up the walk, now, 
Who quotes Wordsworth and 
praises her " Thoiujlits on a 
Star." 

Meanwhile, there is dancing in 
yonder green bower 
A swarm of young midges. They 
dance high and low. 
'Tis a sweet little species that lives 
but one hour, 
And the eldest was born half an 
hour ago. 

.One impulsive young midge I hear 

ardently pouring 

In the ears of a shy little wanton 

in gauze, [adoring : 

His eternal devotion ; his ceaseless 

Whicli shall last till the Universe 

breaks from its laws : 

His passion is not, lie declares, the 
mere fever 
Of a rapturous moment. It knows 
no control : 
It will burn in his breast through 
existence forever, 
Immutably fixed in the deeps of 
the soul ! 

She wavers : she flutters : . . . male 
midges are fickle : 
Dare she trust him her future ? . . . 
she asks with a sigh : 
He implores, . . . and a tear is be- 
ginning to trickle : 
She "is weak : they embrace, and 
. . . the lovers pass by. 

While they pass me, down here on a 
rose leaf has lighted 
A pale midge, his feelers all droop- 
ing and torn : 



His existence is withered ; its future 
is blighted : 
His hopes are betrayed : and his 
breast is forlorn. 

By the midge his heart trusted his 
heart is deceived, now, 
In the virtue of midges no more he 
believes : 
From love in its falsehood, once 
Avildly believed, now 
He will bury liis desolate life in 
the leaves. 

His friends would console him . . . 
tlie noblest and sagest 
Of midges have held that a midge 
lives again. 
In Eternity, they say, the strife then 
now wagest 
With sorrow shall cease . . . but 
their words are in vain ! 

Can Eternity bring back the seconds 
now wasted 
In hopeless desire ? or restore to 
his breast 
The belief he has lost, Mith the bliss 
he once tasted, 
Embracing the midge that his 
being loved best ? 

His friends would console him . , . 
life yet is before him ; 
Many hundred long seconds he 
still lias to live : 
In the state yet a mighty career 
spreads before him : 
Let him seek in the great world of 
action to strive ! 

There is Fame ! there's Ambition I 
and, grander than either. 
There is Freedon ! . . . the pro- 
gi-ess and march of the 
race ! . . . 
But to Freedom his breast beats no 
longer, and neither 
Ambition nor action her loss can 
replace. 



IN ENGLAND. 



245 



If the time had been spent in ac- 
quiring nestlietics 
I have squandered in learning this 
language of inidges, 
There might, for my friend in her 
peripatetics, 
Have been now imo asses to help 
o'er the bridges. 

As it is, ... ril report her the 
wliole conversation. 
It Avonld have been longer ; but, 
somehow or other 
(In the midst of that misanthrope's 
long lamentation), 
A midge in my right eye became a 
young mother. 

Since my friend is so clever, I'll ask 
her to tell me 
Why the least living thing (a mere 
midge in the egg !) 
Canmalie a man's tears flow, as now 
it befell me . . . 
O you dear clever woman, explain 
it, I beg ! 



THE LAST TIME THAT I MET 
LADY RUTH. 

Theke are some things hard to 
imderstand. 
O help me, my God, to trxist in 
thee ! 
But I never shall forget her soft 
white hand, 
And her eyes when she looked at 
nie. 

It is hard to pray the very same 
prayer 
Which once at our mother's knee 
Ave prayed — 
When, where we trusted our whole 
heart, there 
Oiu" trust hath been betrayed. 

I swear that the milk-white muslin 
so light 
On her virgin breast, where it lay 
demure, 



Seemed to be toucht to a purer 
white 
By the touch of a breast so pure. 

I deemed her the one thing un- 
defiled 
By the air we breathe, in a world 
of sin : 
The truest, the tenderest, purest 
child 
A man ever trusted in ! 

When she blamed me (she, with her 
fair child's face !) 
That never with her to the Church 
I went 
To partalce of the Gospel of truth 
and grace, 
And the Cliristian sacrament, 

And I said I would go for her own 
sweet sake, 
Though it was but herself I should 
worship there. 
How that happy child's face strove 
to take 
On its dimples a serious air ! 

I remember the chair she would set 
for me. 
By the flowers when all the house 
was gone 
To drive in the Park, and I and she 
Were left to be happy alone. 

There she leaned her head on my 
knees, my Euth, 
With the primrose loose in her 
half-closed hands : 
And I told her tales of my wander- 
ing youth 
In the far fair foreign lands. — 

The last time I met her was here in 
town, 
At a fancy ball at the Duchess of 
D., 
On the stairs, where her husband 
was handing her down. 
— There we met, and she talked 
to me. 



She, with powder in hair, and patch 
on chin, 
And I, in the garb of a pilgrim 
Priest, 
And between ns both, without and 
witliin, 
A hundred years at least ! 

We talked of the House, and tlie late 
long rains, 
And the crush at the French Am- 
bassador's ball. 
And . . . well, I have not blown 
out my brains. 
You see I can laugh. That is all. 

MATRIMOJ^IAL COUNSELS. 

You are going to marry my pretty 
relation, 
My dove-like young cousin, so soft 
in the eyes, 
You are entering on life's settled 
dissimulation, 
And, if you'd be happy, in season 
be wise. 

Take my counsel. The more that, 
in church, you are tempted 
To yawn at the sermon, the more 
you'll attend. 
The more you'd from milliner's bills 
be exempted. 
The more on your wife's little 
wishes you'll spend. 

You'll be sure, every Christmas, to 
send to the rector 
A dozen of wine, and a hamper or 
two. 
The more your wife plagues you, 
the more you'll respect her. 
She'll be pleasing your friend, if 
she's not plaguing you. 

For women of course, like ourselves, 
need emotion ; 
And bappy the husband, whose 
failings afford 
To the wife of his heart, such good 
cause for commotion 
That she seeks no excitement, save 
plaguing her lord. 



Above all, you'll be careful that 

nothing offends, too,' 
Your wife's lady's maid, though 

she give herself airs. 
With the friend of a friend it is well 

to be friends too, 
And especially so, when that 

friend lives uj) stairs. 

Under no provocation you'll ever 
avow yourself 
A little put out, when you're kept 
at the door. 
And you never, I scarcely need say, 
will allow yourself 
To call your wife's mother a vulgar 
old bore. 

However she dresses, you'll never 
suggest to her 
That her taste, as to colors, could 
scarcely be worse, 
Of the rooms in your house, you will 
give up the best to her. 
And you never will ask for the 
carriage, of course. 

If, at times with a doubt on the soul 
and her future, 
Ilevelation and reason, existence 
should trouble you. 
You'll be always on guard to keep 
carefully mute your 
Ideas on the subject, and read 
Dr. W. 

Bring a shawl with you, home, when 
you come from the club, sir, 
Or a ring, least your wife, when 
you meet her, should iDout ; 
And don't fly In a rage and behave 
like a cub, sir. 
If jon find that the fire, like your- 
self, has gone out. 

In eleven good instances out of a 
dozen, 
'Tis the husband's a cur, when the 
wife is a cat. 
She is meekness itself, my soft-eyed 
litte cousin, 
I3ut a wife has her rights, and I'd 
have you know that. 



IN ENGLAND. 



247 



Keep my counsel. Life's struggles 
are brief to be borne, friend. 
In Heaven there's no marriage nor 
giving in marriage. 
"When Death comes, think how 
truly your widow will mourn, 
friend, 
And your worth not the best of 
your friends will disparage ! 



SEE-SAW. 

She was a harlot, and I was a thief: 
But we loved each other beyond 

belief : 
She lived in the garret, and I in the 

kitchen. 
And love was all that we both wei"e 

rich in. 

When they sent her at last to the 
hospital, 

Both day and night my tears did fall ; 

They fell so fast that, to dry their 
grief, 

I borrowed my neighbor's handker- 
chief. 

The world, which, as it is brutally 

taught, ^ 

Still judges the act in lieu of the 

thought. 
Found my hand in my neighbor's 

pocket. 
And clapped me, at once, under chain 

and locket. 

When they asked me about it, I told 

them plain. 
Love it was that had turned my 

brain : 
How should I heed where my hand 

had been, 
When my heart was dreaming of 

Celestine ? 

Twelve friends were so struck by my 

woful air, 
That they sent me abroad for change 

of air : 



And, to prove me the kindness of 
their intent, 

They sent me at charge of the Gov- 
ernment. 

When I came back again, — whom, 

think you, I meet 
But Celestine, here, in Eegent 

Street ? 
In a carriage adorned with a coronet, 
And a dress, all flounces, and lace, 

and jet : 

For her carriage drew up to the 
booksellers door, 

Where they publish those nice little 
books for the poor : 

I took off my hat : and my face she 
knew. 

And gave me — a sermon by Mr. Bel- 
lew. 

But she gave me (God bless her !) 

along with the book, 
Such a sweet sort of smile, such a 

heavenly look. 
That, as long as I live, I shall never 

forget 
Celestine, in her coach with the earl's 

coronet. 

There' s a game that men play at in 

great London-town ; 
Whereby some must go up, sir, and 

some must go down : 
And, since the mud sticks to your 

coat if you fall, 
WTiy, the strongest among us keep 

close to the wall. 

But some day, soon or late, in my 

shoes I shall stand. 
More exalted than any great Duke 

in the land ; 
A clean shirt on my back, and a rose 

in my coat, 
And a collar conferred by the Queen 

round my throat. 

And I know that my Celestine will 

not forget 
To be there, in her coach with my 

lord's coronet : 



248 



THE WANDERER. 



She will smile to me then, as she 

smiled to me now : 
I shall nod to her gayly, and make 

her my bow ; — 

Before I i-ejoin all those famous old 

thieves 
Whose deeds have immortalized 

Rome, sir, and Greece : 
Whose names are inscribed upon 

History's leaves, 
Like my own on the hooks of the 

City Police : — 

Alexander, and Caesar, and other 
great robbers, 

Wlio once tried to i^ocket the whole 
universe : 

Not to speak of our own parliament- 
ary jobbers, 

With their hands, bless them all, in 
the popular purse ! 



BABYLONIA. 

Enough of simpering and grimace ! 
Enough of damning one's soul for 
notliing ! 
Enough of Vacuity trimmed Avith 
lace ! 
And Poverty proud of her purple 
clothing ! 
In Babylon, wliene'er there's a wind 
(Whether it blow rain, or whether 
it blow sand). 
The Aveatbercocks change their 
mighty mind ; 
And the weathercocks are forty 
thousand. 
Forty thousand weathercocks, 
Each well-minded to keep his 
place,' 
Turning about in the great and 
small ways ! 
Each knows, Aviialever the weather's 
shocks, 
That the wind will never blow in 
his face ; 
And in Babylon the wind blows 
always. 



I cannot tell how it may strike you, 
But it strikes me now, for the first 
and last time. 
That there may be better things to do, 
Than watching the Aveathercocks 
for pastime. 
And I Avish I Avere out of Babylon, 

Out of sight of column and steeple. 
Out of fashion and form, for one, 
And out of the midst of this 
double-faced people. 
Enough of catgut ! Enough of the 

sight 
Of the dolls it sets dancing all the 
night ! 
For tbere is a no' ion come to me. 

As here, in Babylon, I am lying. 
That far away, over the sea. 
And under another moon and 
star. 
Braver, more beautiful beings are 

dying 
(Dying, not dancing, dying, dying !) 
To a music nobler far. 

Full well I know that, before it came 
To inhabit this feeble, faltering 
frame. 
My soul was Aveary ; and, ever 
since then. 
It has seemed to me, in the stir 
and bustle 
Of this eager Avorld of Avomen and 
men, 
That my life Avas tired before it 

began. 
That even the child had fatigued the 
man. 
And brain and heart have djne 
their part 
To Avear out sinew and muscle. 

Yet, sometimes, a Avish has come to 

me. 
To Avander, wander, I knoAV not 

where. 
Out of the sight of all that I see, 
Out of the hearing of all that I 

hear ; 
Where only the taAvny, bold, wild 

beast 
Roams his realms ; and find, at least, 



IN ENGLAND. 



249 



The strength ^\•hich even the beast 
finds tliere, 
A joy, though but a, savage joy ; — 
Were it only to find the "food I 
need, 
The scent to track, and the force to 
destroy, 
And the very appetite to feed ; 
Tlie bliss of the sense without the 

thought. 
And the freedom, for once in my 
life, from aught 
That fills my life with care. 

And never this thought hath so 
wildly crost 
My mind, with its wildering, 
strange tenrptation, 
As just when I was enjoying the 
most 
The blessings of what is called 
Civilization : — 
The glossy boot which tightens the 
foot ; 
The club at which my friend was 
black-balled 
(I am sorry, of course, but one 
must be exclusive) ; 
The yellow kid glove whose shape I 
approve, 
And tlie journal in which I am 
kindly called 
Whatever's not libellous — only 
abusive : 
The ball to which I am careful to go. 
Where the folks are so cool, and 

the rooms are so hot ; 
The opera, Avhich shows one what 
music — is not ; 
And the simper from Lady . . . but 
why should you know ? 

Yet, I am a part of the things I de- 
spise. 
Since my life is bound by their 
common span : 
And each idler I meet, in square 
or in street, 
Hath Mithin him what all that's 
without him belies, — 
The miraculous, infinite heart of 
man, 



With its countless capabilities ! 
The sleekest guest at the general 
feast. 
That at every sip, as he sups, says 
grace, 
Hath in him a touch of the untamed 
beast ; 
And chaiige of nature is change of 
place. 
The judge on the bench, and the 
scamp at the dock. 
Have, in each of them, much that 
is common to both ; 
Each is part of the parent stock. 
And their difference comes of their 
different cloth. 

'Twixt the Seven Dials and Exeter 
Hall 
The gulf that is fixed is not so 
wide : 
And the fool that, last year, at Her 
Majesty's Ball, 
Sickened me so with his simper of 
pride. 
Is the hero now heard of, the first on 
the wall, 
With the bayonet-wound in his 
side. 

O, for the times which were (if any 
Time be heroic) heroic indeed ! 
When the men were few. 
And the deeds to do 
Were mighty, and many. 

And each man in his hand held 
a noble deed. 
Now the deeds are few, 
And the men are many. 
And each man has, at most, but 
a noble need. 

Blind fool ! . . . I know that all acted 
time 
By that which succeeds it, is ever 
received 
As calmer, completer, and more sub- 
lime, 
Only because it is finished : be- 
cause 
We only behold the thing it 
achieved ; 



250 



THE WANDERER. 



We behold not the thing that it 
was. 
For, while it stands whole and im- 
mutable, 
In the marble of memorj' — we, 
who have seen 
But the statue before us, — how can 
we tell 
What the men that have hewn at 
the block may have been ? 
Their passion is merged in its pas- 
sionlessness ; 
Their strife in its stillness closed 
forever : 
Their change upon change in its 
changelessi\ess ; 
In its final achievement, their fe- 
verish endeavor : 
Who knows how sculptor on sculptor 

starved 
With the thought in the head by the 

hand uncarved ? 
And he that spread out in its ample 
"repose [brow, 

That grand, indifferent, godlike 
How vainly his own may have ached, 
who knows, 
'Twixt the laurel above and the 
wrinkle below ? 

So again to Babylon I come back, 
Where this fettered giant of Hu- 
man Nature 
Cramped in limb, and constrained 
in stature, 
In the torture-chamber of Van- 
ity lies ; 
Helpless and weak, and compelled to 
speak 
The things he must despise. 
You stars, so still in the midnight 

blue. 
Which over these huddling roofs I 
view. 
Out of reach of this Babylonian 

riot, — 
We so restless, and you so quiet. 
What is difference 'twixt us and you ? 

Tou each may have pined with a 
pain divine, 
For aught I know, 



As wildly as this weak heart of mine, 
In an Age ago : 

For whence should you have that 
stern repose. 

Which, here, dwells but on the brows 
of those 
Who have lived, and survived life's 
fever. 

Had you never known the ravage 
and fire 

Of that inexpressible Desire, 

Which wastes and calcines whatever 
is less 

In the soul, than the soul's deej) con- 
sciousness 
Of a life that shall last forever ? 

Doubtless, doubtless, again and 
again, 
Many a mouth has starved for 
bread 
In a city whose wharves are 
choked with corn 
And many a heart hath perished 
dead 
From being too utterly forlorn. 
In a city whose streets are choked 

with men. 
Yet the bread is there, coiild one find 

it out : 
And there is a heart for a heart, no 
doubt, 
Wherever a human heart may 
beat ; 
And room for courage, and truth, 

and love, 
To move, wherever a man may move, 
In the thiekliest crowded street. 

O Lord of the soul of man, whose 

will 
Made earth for man, and man for 

heaven. 
Help all thy creatures to fulfil 

The hopes to each one given ! 
So fair tliou mad est, and so complete, 
The little daisies at our feet ; 
So sound, and so robvist in heart, 
The patient beasts, that bear their 

part 
In this world's labor, never asking 
The reason of its ceaseless tasking ; 



IN SWITZERLAND. 



251 



Hast tliou made man, though more 

in kind, 
By reason of his son! and mind, 
Yet less in unison witli life, 
By reason of an inward strife, 
Than these, thy simpler creatures, 

are. 
Submitted to his use and care ? 

For these, indeed, appear to Uve 
To the full verge of their own 
power. 
Nor ever need that time should give 
To life one space beyond the hour. 
They do not pine for what is not ; 
Nor quarrel with the things which 
are ; 
Their yesterdays are all forgot ; 
Their morrows are not feared from 
far : 
They do not weep, and wail, and 
moan. 
For what is past, or what's to be, 
Or what's not yet, and may be 
never ; 
They do not their own lives disown. 
Nor haggle with eternity 
For some unknown Forever. 



Ah yet, — in this must I believe 
That man is nobler than the rest : — 
That, looking in on his own breast, 
He measures thus his strength 

and size 
With supernatural destinies. 
Whose shades o'er all his 
being fall ; 
And, in that dread comparison 
'Twixt what is deemed and what 
is done. 
He can, at intervals, perceive 

How weak he is, and small. 



Therefore, he knows himself a child, 
Set iu this rudimental star, 

To learn the alphabet of Being ; 
By straws dismayed, by toys beguiled, 
Yet conscious of a home afar ; 

With all these things here but ill 
agreeing. 
Because he trusts, in manhood's 

prime. 
To walk in some celestial clime ; 
Sit in his Father's house ; and be 
The inmate of Eternity. 



BOOK IY._IN SWITZERLAND 



THE HEART AND NATURE. 

The lake is calm ; and, calm, the 
skies 
In yonder silent sunset glow. 
Where, o'er the woodland, home- 
ward flies 
The solitary crow ; 

The woodman to his hut is gone ; 

The wood-dove in the elm is still ; 
The last sheep drinks, and wanders 
on 

To graze at will. 

Nor aught the pensive prospect 

breaks, [grass. 

Save where my slow feet stir the 



Or where the trout to diamonds 
breaks 
The lake's pale glass. 

No moan the cushat makes, to heave 
A leallet round her windless nest ; 

The air is silent in the eve ; 
The world's at rest. 

All bright below ; all calm above ; 

No sense of pain, no sign of wrong 
Save in thy heart of hopeless love, 

Poor child of Song ! 

Why must the soul through Nature 
rove. 
At variance with her general plan ? 



252 



THE WANDERER. 



A stranger to tlie Power, Avliose love 
Soothes all save Man ? 

Why lack the strength of meaner 
creatures ? 
The wandering sheep, the grazing 
■ kinc, 
Are surer of their simple natures 
Tliau I of mine. 

For all their wants the poorest land 
Affords supply ; they browse and 
breed ; 

I scarce divine, and ne'er have found. 
What most I need. 

O God, that in this human heart 
Hath made Belief so hard to grow, 

And set the doubt, the pang, the 
smart 
In all we know — 

Why hast thou, too, in solemn jest 
At this tormented thinking-power. 

Inscribed, in flame on yonder West, 
In hues on every flower, 

Through all the vast unthinking 
sphere 

Of mere material Force without. 
Rebuke so vehement and severe 

To the least doubt ? 

And robed the world and hung the 
night, 
With silent, stern, and solemn 
forms ; 
And strown with sounds of awe and 
might. 
The seas and storms, — 

All lacking ]iower to impart 
To man tlie secret he assails, 

But armed to crush him, if his lieart 
Once doubts or fails ! 

To make him feel the same forlorn 
Despair the Fiend hath felt ere 
now. 

In gazing at tlie stern swoct scorn 
On Michael's brow. 



A QUIET MOMENT. 

Stay with me. Lady, while you 
may ! 
For life's so sad, — this hour's so 
sweet ; 
Ah, Lady, — life too long will stay ; 
Too soon this hour will fleet. 

How fair this mountain's purple 

bust, 
• Alone in high and glimmering air! 
And see, . . . those village spires, 
upthrust 
From yon dark plain, — how fair ! 

How sweet yon lone and lovely scene. 
And yonder dropping fiery ball. 

And eve's sweet spirit, that steals, 
unseen. 
With darkness over all ! 

This blesse'd hour is yours, and 
eve's ; 

And this is why it seems so sweet 
To lie, as husht as fallen leaves 

In autumn, at your feet ; 

And watch, awhile released from 
care. 

The twilight in yon quiet skies, 
The twilight in your quiet hair. 

The twilight in your eyes : 

Till in my soul the twilight stays, 
— Eve's twilight, since the dawn's 
is o'er ! 
And life's too well-known worthless 
days 
Become luiknown once more. 

Your face is no uncommon face ; 

Like it, I have seen many a one, 
And may again, before my race 

Of care be wholly run. 

But not the less, those earnest 
brows. 
And that pure oval cheek can 
charm ; — 
Those eyes of tender deep repose ; 
That breast, the heart keeps warm 



IN SWITZERLAND. 



253 



Because a sense of goodness sleeps 
In every sober, soft, brown tress, 

That o'er those brows, uncared for, 
keeps 
Its shadowy quietness : 

Because that lip's soft silence shows, 
Though passion it hath never 
l^nown, 
That well, to kiss one kiss, it 
knows — 
— A woman's holiest one ! 

Yours is the charm of calm good 
sense. 
Of wholesome views of earth and 
heaven, 
Of pity, touched with reverence, 
To all things freely given. 

Your face no sleepless midnight fills. 
For all its serious sweet endeavor; 

It xjlants no pang, no rapture thrills, 
But ah ! — it pleases ever ! 

Not yours is Cleopatra's eye. 
And Juliet's tears you never knew : 

Never will amorous Antony 
Kiss kingdoms out for you ! 

Never for you will Eomeo's love, 
From deeps of moonlit musing, 
break 
To poetry about the glove 
Whose touch may press your 
cheek. 

But ah, in one, — no Antony 
Nor Borneo now, nor like to 
these, — 

(Whom neither Cleopatra's eye. 
Nor Juliet's tears, could please) 

How well they luU the lurking care 
AVhich else within the mind en- 
dures, — 
That soft white hand, that soft dark 
hair, 
And that soft voice of yours ! 

So. while you stand, a fragile form. 
With that close shawl aromid you 
drawn. 

And eve's last ardors fading warm 
Adown the mountain lawn, 



'Tis sweet, although we part to-mor- 
row. 
And ne'er, the same, shall meet 
again. 
Awhile, from old habitual sorrow 
To cease ; to cease from pain ; 

To feel that, ages past, the soul 
Hath lived — and ages hence will 
live ; 
And taste, in hours like this, the 
whole 
Of all the years can give. 

Then, Lady, yet one moment stay, 
While your sweet face makes all 
things sweet, 

For ah, the charm will pass away 
Before again we meet ! 

N^NI^. 

Soft, soit be thy sleep in the land of 
the West, 
Fated maiden ! 
Fair lie the flowers, love, and light, 
on thy breast 
Passion-laden, 
In the place where thou art, by the 
storm-beaten strand 
Of the moaning Atlantic, 
While, alone with my sorrow, I roam 
through thy land. 
The beloved, the romantic ! 
And thy faults, child, sleep where in 
those dark eyes Death closes 
All their doings and undoings ; 
For who counts the thorns on last 
year's perisht roses ? " 
Smile, dead rose, in thy ruins ! 
With thy beauty, its frailty is over. 
No token 
Of all which thou wast ! 
Not so much as the stem whence the 
blossom w^as broken 
Hath been spared by the frost. 
With thy lips, and thine eyes, and 
thy long golden tresses, 
Cold . . . and so young too ! 
All lost, like the sweetness which 
died with our kisses, 



254 



THE WANDERER, 



On the lips we once clung to. 
Be it so ! O too loved, and too lovely, 
to linger 
Where Age in its bareness 
Creeps slowly, and Time with his 
terrible finger 
Effaces all fairness. 
Thy being was but beauty, thy life 
only rapture. 
And, ere both were over. 
Or yet one delight had escaped from 
thy capture, 
Death canie,— thy last lover, 
And found thee, ... no care on thy 
brow, in thy tresses 
No silver — all gold there ! 
On thy lips, when he kissed them, 
their last human kisses 
Had scarcely grown cold there. 
Thine was only earth's joy, not its 
sorrow, its sinning, 
Its friends that are foes too. 
O, fair was thy life in its lovely begin- 
ning, 
And fair in its close too ! 
But 1 ? . . . since we parted, both 
mournful and many 
Life's changes have been to me: 
And of all the love-garlands Youth 
wove me, not any 
Remain that are green to me. 
O, where are the nights, with thy 
touch and thy breath in them, 
Faint with heart-beating? 
The fragrance, the darkness, the life 
and the death in them, 
— Parting and meeting? 
All the world ours in that hour ! . . . 
O, the silence. 
The moonlight, and, far in it, 
O, the one nightingale singing a mile 
hence ! [it ! 

The oped window — one star in 
Sole witness of stolen sweet mo- 
ments, unguest of 
By the world in its primness ; — 
Just one smile to adore by the star- 
light : the rest of 
Thy soul in the dimness ! 
If I glide through the door of thy 
chamber, and sit there, 



The old, faint, uncertain 
Fragrance, that followed thee, surely 
will flit there, — 
O'er the chairs, — in the cur- 
tain : — 
But thou ? . . . O thou missed, and 
thou mourned one ! O never, 
Nevermore, shall we rove 
Through chamber, or garden, or by 
the dark river 
Soft lamps burn above ! 

dead, child, dead, dead — all the 

shrunken romance 
Of the dream life begun with ! 
But tliou, love, canst alter no more — 
smile or glance ; 
Thy last change is done with. 
As a moon that is sunken, a sunset 
that's o'er. 
So thy face keeps the semblance 
Of the last look of love, the last grace 
that it wore. 
In my mourning remembrance. 
As a strain from the last of thy songs, 
when we parted. 
Whose echoes thrill yet. 
Through the long dreamless nights 
of sad years, loneiy-hearted. 
With their haunting regret, — 
Though nerveless the hand now, and 
shattered the lute too. 
Once vocal for me, 
There tloats through life's ruins, 
when all's dark and mute too. 
The music of thee ! 
Beauty, how brief ! Life, how long ! 
. . . well, love's done now ! 
Down the path fate arranged for 
me 

1 tread faster, because I must tread 

it alone now. 
— This is all that is changed for 

me. 
My heart must have broken, ere I 

broke the fetter 
Thyself didst undo, love. 
— Ah, there's many a purer, and 

many a better, 
But more loved, . . . O, how few, 

love ! 



IN HOLLAND. 



255 



BOOK v. — IN HOLLAND 



AUTUMN. 

So now, then, Summer's over — by 
degrees. 
Hark ! 'tis the wind in yon red 
region grieves. 
"Who says the world grows bet- 
ter, growing old ? 
See ! what poor trumpery on tliose 
pauper trees, 
That cannot lieep, for all their fine 
gold leaves, 
Their last bird from the cold. 



This 



Of 



puckered , 
poets 
(only hear 



her 



is Dame Nature, 

pinched, and sour, 

all the charms 

praised, bereft, 
Scowling and scoldini 

her, there !) 
Like that old spiteful Queen, in her 

last horn". 
Whom Spenser, Shakespeare, sung 

to . . . nothing left 
But wrinkles and red hair ! 

LEAFLESS HOUKS. 

The pale sim, through the spectral 
wood. 

Gleams sparely, where I pass : 
My footstep, silent as my mood, 

Falls in the silent grass. 
Only my shadow points before me, 

Wliere I am moving now : 
Only sad ntemories murmur o'er me 

From every leafless bough : 
And out of the nest of last year's 
Redbreast 

Is stolen the very snow. 

ON MY TWENTY -FOUETH 
YEAR. 

The night's in November : the 
winds are at strife : 
The snow's on the hill, and the ice 
on the mere : 



The world to its winter is turned 
and my life 
To its twenty-fourth year. 

The swallows are flown to the south 
long ago : 
The roses are fallen : the wood- 
laud is sere. 
Hope's flown with the swallows : 
Love's rose will not grow 
In my twenty-fourth year. 

The snow on the tlu-eshold : the cold 
at the heart : 
But the fagot to warm, and the 
wine-cuj) to cheer : 
God's help to look up to : and cour- 
age to start 
On my twenty-fom'th year. 

And 'tis well that the month of the 
roses is o'er ! 
The last, which I plucked for 
Nertea to wear. 
She gave her new lover. A man 
should do more 
With his twenty-fourth year 

Than mourn for a woman, because 
she's unkind. 
Or i^ine for a woman, because she 
is fair. 
Ah, I loved you, Nera;a ! But now 
. . . never mind, 
'Tis my twenty fourth year ! 

What a thmg ! to have done with 
the follies of Youth, 
Ere Age brings its follies ! . . . 
though many a tear 
It should cost, to see Love fly away, 
and find Truth 
In one's twenty-fourth year. 

The Past' s golden valleys are drained. 
I must plant 
On the Future's rough upland new 
harvests, I fear. 



2S6 



THE WANl)ERER. 



Ho, the plough and the team 1 . . . 
wlio would i^erish of want 
In his twenty-fourth year ? 

Man's heart is a well, which forever 
renews 
The void at the hottom, no sound- 
ing comes near : 
And Love does not die, though its 
object I lose 
In my twenty-fourth year. 

The great and the little are only in 
name. 
The smoke from my chimney casts 
shadows as drear 
On the heart, as the smoke from 
Vesuvius in tlame : 
And my twenty-fourth year. 

From the joys that have cheered it, 
the cares that have troubled, 
"What is wise to pm'sue, what is 
well to revere. 
May judge all as fully as though life 
were doubled 
To its forty-eighth year ! 

If the prospect grow dim, 'tis be- 
cause it grows wide. 
Every loss hath its gain. So, from 
sjjhere on to sphere, 
Man mounts up the ladder of Time : 
so I stride 
Up my twenty-fourth year ! 

Exulting ? . . . no . . . sorrowing ? 
, . . no . . . with a mind 
Whose regret chastens hope, whose 
faith triumphs o'er fear : 
Not repining : not confident : no, 
but resigned 
To my twenty-foiurth year. 

JACQUELINE, 

COUNTESS OF HOLLAND AND HAIN- 

AULT.* 

Is it the twilight, or my fading sight, 
Makes all so dim around me ? No, 
the nisiht 



* Who was inanied to the impotent and 
worthless John of Brabant, affianced to 



Is come already. See ! through yon- 
der pane. 

Alone in the gray air, that star 
again — 

Which shines so wan, I used to call 
it mine 

For its pale face : like Countess 
Jacqueline 

Who reigned in Brabant once . . . 
that's years ago. 

I called so mucli mine, then : so 
nuich seemed so ! 

And see, my own ! — of all those 
things, my star 

(Because God hung it there, in 
heaven, so far 

Above the reach and want of those 
hard men) [Then 

Is all they have not taken from me. 

I call it still My Star, Why not? 
Tlie dust 

Hath claimed the dust : no more. 
And moth and rust 

May rot the throne, the kingly pur- 
ple fray : 

What then ? You star saw king- 
doms rolled away 

Ere mine was taken from me. It 
survives. 

But think, Beloved, — in that high 
life of lives, 

When our souls see the suns them- 
selves burn low 

Before that Sun of Kighteousness, — 
and know 

What is, and was, before the suns 
were lit, — 

How love is all in all . . . Look, look 
at it, 

My star, — God's star, — for being 
God's 'tis mine : 

Had it been man's ... no matter 
. . . see it shine — 



"good Duke Humphry," of Gloucester, 
and linally wedded to Frank von Borseien, 
a gentleman of Zealand, in consequence of 
which inari'iai^e she lost even Uie title of 
Countess. 8he died at the age of tJiirty- 
aix, after a lite of unparalleled adventure 
and misrt>rUiue. See any J5iographical 
Dictionary, or any History of the Nether- 
lands. 



IN HOLLAND. 



257 



The old wan beam, whicli I have 

watched ere now 
So many a wretched night, when this 

poor brow 
Ached 'neath the sorrows of its 

thorny crown. 
Its crovon ! . . . ah, droop not, dear, 

those fond eyes down. 
No gem in all that shattered coro- 
net 
Was half so precious as the tear 

which wet 
Just now this pale sick forehead. O 

my own, 
My husband, need was, that I should 

. have known 
Much sorrow, — more than most 

Queens, — all know some, — 
Ere, dying, I could bless thee for the 

home 
Far dearer than the Palace, — call thy 

tear. 
The costliest gem that ever sparkled 

here. 

Infold me, my Belove'd. One more 

kiss. 
O, I must go ! 'Twas willed I should 

not miss 
Life's secret, ere I left it. And now 

see, — 
My lips touch thine — thine arm en- 
circles me — 
The secret's found — God beckons — 

I must go. 
Earth's best is given. — Heaven's 

turn is come to show 
How much its best earth's best may 

yet exceed. 
Lest earth's should seem the very 

best indeed. 
So we must part a little ; but not 

long. 
I seem to see it all. My lands be- 
long 
.To Philip still ; but thine will be 

my grave, 
(The only strip of land which I could 

save !) 
Not much, but wide enough for some 

few flowers, 



Thou'lt plant there, by and by, in 

later hours : 
Duke Humphry, when they tell him 

I am dead 
(And so young too !) will sigh, and 

shake his head. 
And if his wife should chide, "Poor 

Jacqueline," 
He'll add, "You know she never 

could be mine." 
And men will say, when some one 

speaks of me, 
"Alas, it was a piteous history. 
The life of that poor countess!" 

For the rest 
Will never know, my love, how I 

was blest. 
Some few of my poor Zealanders, 

perchance, 
Will keep kind memories of me ; and 

in France 
Some minstrel sing my story. Piti- 
less John 
Will prosper still, no doubt, as he 

has done. 
And still praise God with blood up- 
on the Eood. 
Philip will, doubtless, still be called 

"The Good." 
And men will curse and kill : and 

the old game 
Will weary out new hands : the love 

of fame 
Will sow new sins : thou wilt not be 

renowned : 
And I shall lie quite quiet imder 

gromid. 
My life i^ a torn book. But at the 

end 
A little page, quite fair, is saved, my 

friend, 
Where thou didst write thy name. 

No stain is there, 
No blot, — from marge to marge, all 

pure — no tear ; — 
The last page, saved from all, and 

writ by thee. 
Which I shall take safe up to Hea- 
ven with me. 
All's not in vain, since this be so. 

Dost grieve ? 



258 



THE WANDERER. 



Beloved, I besoocli thee to believe 
AlUiouich this be tlie last page of mv 

life, 
It is my heart's first, only one. Thy 

^vife, 
Poor though she be, O tliou sole 

wealth of mine, 
Isliap]iiei- than the Countess Jacque- 
line ! 
And since my heart owns thine, say. 

— am I not 
A Queen, my chosen, though by all 

forgot ? 
Though all forsake, yet is not this 

thy hand ? 
I, a lone wanderer in a darkened 

land, 
I, a poor pilgrim with no staff of 

hope, 
I, a late traveller down the evening 

slope. 
Where any sparlc, the glow-worm's 

by the way. 
Had been a light to bless . . . have 

I, O say, 
Not found, iJelovc'd, in thy tender 

eyes. 
Alight more sweet than morning's ? 

As thei-e dies 
Some day of storm all glorious in its 

even, 
My life grows loveliest as it fades in 

heaven. 
This earthly house breaks up. This 

Hesli must fade. 
So many shocks of grief slow breach 

have made 
In the po;w frame. "Wrongs, insults, 

treacheries, 
Hopes broken down, and memory 

Avlilch sighs 
In, like a niglil-wind ! Life Avas 

never meant 
To bear so much in such frail tene- 
ment. 
Why should we seek to patch and 

plaster o'er 
This shattered roof, cruslit windows, 

bniken door 
The light already shines through ? 

Let them break. 



Yet would I gladly live for thy dear 

sake, 
O my heart's first and last, if that 

could be ! 
In vain ! . . . yet grieve not thou. 

I shall not see 
England again, and those white 

cliffs ; nor ever 
Again those four gray towers beside 

the rivei', 
And London's roaring bi'idges: never 

more 
Those windows with the market- 
stalls before. 
Where the red-kirtlcd market-girls 

went by 
In the great square, beneath the 

great gray sky, 
In Brussels : nor in Holland, night 

or day, 
Watcli those long lines of siege, and 

fight at bay 
Among my broken army, in default 
Of Gloucester's failing forces from 

Ilainault : 
Niir shall I pace again those gardens 

gi'cen, 
With their dipt alleys, Avhere they 

called me Queen, 
lu Bral)ant once. For all these 

things are gone. 
But thee 1 shall behold, my chosen 

one. 
Though we should seem whole 

worlds on worlds apait, 
Because thou wilt be ever in my 

heart. 
Nor shall I leave thee wholly. I 

shall be 
An evening thought, — a morning 

dream to thee, — 
A silence in thy life when, through 

the night. 
The bell strikes, or the sun, with 

sinking light. 
Smites all the empty windows. As 

there sjirout 
Daisies, and dimpling tufts of vio- 
lets, out 
Among the grass where some corpse 

lies asleep, 



IN HOLLAND. 



^9 



fao round tliy life, where I lie buried 

deep, 
A thousand little tender thoughts 

shall sjaring, 
A thousand gen lie memories wind 

and cling. 
O, promise me, my own, before my 

soul 
Is houseless, — let the great world 

turn and roll 
Upon its way unvext . . . Its 

pomps, its powers ! 
The dust says to the dust, ..." the 

earth is ours." 
I would not, if I could, be Queen 

again 
For all the walls of the wide world 

contain. 
Be thou content with silence. Who 

would raise 
A little dust and noise of human 

praise, 
If he could see, in yonder distance 

dim. [him ? 

Tlie silent eye of God that watches 
Oh I could St thou see all that I see 

to-niglit 
Upon the brinks of the great Infi- 
nite ! 
*' Come out of her, my people, lest ye 

be 
Partakers of her sins !" . . . My 

love, but we 
Our treasure where no thieves break 

in and steal, 
Have stored, I trust. Earth's weal 

is not our weal. 
Let the world mind its business — 

peace or war. 
Ours is elsewhere. Look, look, — my 

star, my star ! 
It grows, it glows, it spreads in light 

unfurled ; — 
Said I "my star?" No star — a 

world — God's world ! 
What hymns adown the jasper sea 

are rolled, 
Even to these sick pillows ! Who 

- infold 
White wings about me ? Rest, rest, 

rest ... I come ! 



Love ! I think that I am near ay 

home. 
Whence was that music ? Was it 

Heaven's I heard ? 
Write "Blesse'd are the dead that 

die i' the Lord, 
Because they rest," . . . because 

their toil is o'er. 
The voice of weeping shall be heard 

no more 
In the Eternal city. Neither dying 
Nor sickness, pain nor sorrow, nei- 
ther crying, 
For God shall wipe away all tears. 

Eest, rest, 
Thy hand, my husband, — so — upon 

thy breast ! 

MACROMICEOS. 

It is the star of solitude 

Alight in yon lonely sky. 
The sea is silent in its mood, 

Motherlike moaning a lullaby 

To hush the hungering mystery 
To sleep on its breast subdued. 

The night is alone, and I. 

It is not the scene I am seeing, 

The lonely sky and the sea. 
It is the pathos of Being 

That is making so dark in me 
This silent and solemn hour : — 
The bale of baffled power. 

The wail of unbaffled desire, 
The fire that must ever devour 

The source by which it is fire. 

My spirit expands, expands ! 
I spread out my soul on the sea. 

1 feel for yet imfound lands, 

And I find but the land where She 
Sits, with her sad white hands, 

At her golden broidery. 
In sight of the sorrowful sands, 

In an antique gallery. 
Where, ever beside her, stands 

(Moodily mimicking me) 
The ghost of a something her heart 
demands 

For a blessing which cannot be. 



26o 



THE WANDERER. 



^ 



And broider, broider by night and 
day 
The brede of thy blazing broidery 1 
Till thy beauty be wholly woven 
away 
Into the desolate tapestry. 
Let the thread be scarlet, the gold 

be gay, 
For the damp to dim, and the moth 
to fray : 
Weave in the azure, and crimson, 
and green ! 
Till the slow threads, needling out 

and in. 
To take a fashion and form begin : 
Yet, for all the time and toil, I see 
The work is vain, and will not be 
Like what it was meant to have 
been. 

woman, woman, with face so 

pale ! 
Pale woman, weaving away 
A frustrate life at a lifeless 
loom, 
Early or late, 'tis of little avail 

That thou lightest the lamp in 
the gloom. 
Full well, I see, there is coming a 
day 
When the work shall forever rest 
incomplete. 
Fling, fling the foolish blazon away. 
And weave me a winding-sheet I 

It is not for thee in this dreary hour, 
That I walk, companionless here 
by the shore. 

1 am caught in the eddy and whirl 

of a power 
"Wliich is not grief, and is not love. 

Though it loves and grieves. 
Within me, without me, wherever I 
move 
In the going out of the ghostly 
eves. 
And is changing me more and 
more. 
1 am not mourning for thee, al- 
though 
I love thee, and thou art lost : 
Nor yet for myself, albeit I know 



That my life is flawed and crost : 
But for that sightless, sorrowing 
Soul 
That is feeling blind with immortal 

pain. 
All round, for what it can never 
attain ; 
That prisoned, pining, and passion- 
ate soul. 
So vast, and yet so small ; 
That seems, now nothing, now all, 
That moves me to pity beyond con- 
trol. 
And repulses pity again. 
I am mourning, since mourn I must, 
With those patient Powers that 

bear, 
'Neath the unattainable stars up 
there, 
With the pomp and pall of funeral, 
Subject and yet august, 
The weight of this world's dust : — 

The ruined giaiit under the rock : 
The stricken spirit below the 
ocean : 
And the winged things wounded of 
old by the shock 
That set the earth in motion. 

Ah yet, . . . and yet, and yet, 
If She were here with me, 
If she were here by the sea. 

With the face I cannot forget. 
Then all things would not be 

So fraught with my own regret. 
But what I should feel and see, 

And seize it at last, at last, — 

The secret known and lost in the 
past. 
To unseal the Genii that sleep 
In vials long hid in the deep ; 

By forgotten, fashion less spells held 
fast, 

Where through streets of the cities 
of coral, aghast. 
The sea-nymphs wander and weep. 

MYSTERY. 

The hour was one of mystery. 
When we were sailing, I and she, 



IN HOLLAND. 



261 



Down the dark, the silent stream, 
The stars above were pale with love, 
And a wizard wind did faintly move, 

Lilie a whisper through a dream. 

Her head was on my breast, 

Her loving little head ! 
Her hand in mine was prest, 

And not a word we said ; 
But round and round the night we 
wound, 
Till we came at la;st to the Isle of 
Fays ; 
And, all the while, from the magic 
isle, 
Came that music, that music of 
other days ! 

The lamps in the garden gleamed. 

The Palace was all alight. 
The sound of the viols streamed 

Tlu'ough the windows over the 
night. 
We saw the dancers pass 

At the windows, two by two. 
The dew was on the grass. 

And the glow-worm in the dew. 

We came through the grass to the 

cypi'ess-tree. 
We stood in its shadow, I and she. 
"Thy face, is pale, thine eyes are 

wild. 
What aileth thee, what aileth 

thee?" 

" Naught aileth. me," she murmured 

mild, 
" Only the moonlight makes me 

pale ; 
The moonlight, shining through the 

veil 
Of this black cypress-tree." 

" By yonder moon, whose light so 
soon 
Will fade upon the gloom. 
And this black tree, whose mystery 

Is mingled with the tomb, — 
By Love's brief moon, end Death's 

dark tree, 
Loyest thou me ? " 



Upon my breast she leaned her 
head ; 

" By yonder moon and tree, 
I s^w^ear that all my soul," she said, 

"Is given to thee." 

"I know not what thy soul may be, 

Nor canst thou make it mine. 
Yon stars may all be worlds : for me 

Enough to know they shine. 
Thou art mine evening star. I know 

At dawn star-distant thou wilt be : 
I shall not hear thee murmuring 
low ; 

Thy face I shall not see. 
I love thy beauty : 'twill not stay : 
Let it be all mine while it may. 

I have no bliss save in the kiss 
Thou givest me." 

We came to the statue carved in 

stone. 
Over the fountain. We stood there 

alone. 
" What aileth thee, that thou dost 

sigh ? 
And why is thy hand so cold ?" 
"'Tis the fovmtain that sighs," 

. . . she said, "not I ; 
And the statue, whose hand thou 

dost hold.' 

" By yonder fount, that flows for- 
ever, 
And this statue, that cannot 
move, — 
By the fountain of Time, that ceases 
never. 
And the fixedness of Love, — 
By motion and immutability 
Lovest thou me ? " 



"By the fountain of Time, with its 
ceaseless flow, 
And the image of Love that rests," 
sighed she, 
" I love thee, I swear, , come joy, 
come woe, 
For eternity I" 



262 



THE WANDERER. 



" Eternity is a word so long 
That 1 cannot spell it now ; 

For the nightingale is singing her 
■song 
From yon pomegranate bough. 

Let it mean what it may — Eternity, 

If thon lovest me now as I love thee, 

As I love thee ! " 



We 



We 



came to the Palace 

mounted the stair. 
The great hall -doors wide open 

were. 
And all the dancers that danced in 

the hall 
Greeted us to the festival. 

Tliere were ladies, as fair as fair 

might be, 
But not one of them all was as fair 

as she. 
There were knights that looked at 

them lovingly. 
But not one of them all was loving 

as I. 

Only, each noble cavalier 

Had his throat red-lined from ear 

to ear ; 
'Twas a collar of merit, I have 

heard, 
Which a Queen upon each had once 

conferred. 
And each lovely lady that oned her 

lip 
Let a little moitse's tail outslip ; 
'Twas the fashion there, I know not 

why. 
But fashions are changing con- 

tantly. 
From the crescented naphtha lamps 

each ray 
Streamed into a still enchanted 

blaze ; — 
And fort rom the deep - toned 

orcheslra 
That music, that music of other 

days I 

My arm enlaced her winsome waist, 
^jid dowa the dance we flew : 



We flew, we raced : our lips em- 
braced : 
And our breath was mingled too. 
Round, and roimd, to a magic 
sound — 
(A Avizard waltz to a M'izard 
air !) 
Round and round, we whirled, we 
wound, 
In a circle light and fine : 
My cheek was fanned by her 
fragrant hair. 
And her bosom beat on mine : 
And all the while, in the winding 

ways, 
That music, that music of other 
days, 
With its melodies divine ! 

The palace clock stands in the hall, 
And talks, unheard, of the flight 
of time : 

With a face too pale for a festival 
It telleth a tale too sad for rhyme. 

The palace clock, with a silver note, 
Is chanting the death of the hour 
that dies. 

" What aileth thee ? for I see float 
A shade into thine eyes." 

" Naught aileth me," . . . low 
murmured she, 
" I am faint ■ with the dance, my 
love. 
Give me thine arm : the air is 
warm : 
Lead me unto the grove." 

We wandered into the grove. We 

found 
A bower by woodbine woven round. 

Upon my breast she leaned her 
head : 
I drew her into the bower apart. 
"I swear to thee, my love," she 
said, 
"Thou hast my heart !" 

"Ah, leave' thy little heart at rest 1 
For it is so light, I think, §o 
Ught, 



IN HOLLAND. 



263 



Some wind would blow it away to- 
night, 
If it were not safe in tliy breast. 
But the wondrous brightness on 
thine liair 
Did never seem more bright : 
And tliy beauty never looked more 
fair 
Than thy beaiity looks to-night : 
And this tlini hour, and this wild 
bower, 
Were made for our delight : 
Here we will stay, until the day, 
In yon dark east grows white." 
"This may not be," . . . she an- 
swered lue, 
" For I was lately wed 
VVitli a diamond ring to an Ogre- 
king. 
And I am liis wife," . . . she 
said. 
" My husband is old, but his crown 
is of gold : 
And he hath a cruel ej-e : 
A.nd his arm is long, and his hand is 
strong. 
And his body is seven ells high : 
And alas ! I fear, if he found us 
here, 
That we both should surely die. 

"All day I take my harp, and 
play 
To him on a golden string : 
Thorougli the weary livelong'day 

I play to him. and sing : 
I sing to him till liis white hair 

Begins to curl and creep : 
And his wrinkles old slowly unfold, 
And his brows grow smoolli as 
sleep. 
But at night, when he calls for his 
golden cup. 
Into his wine I pour 
A juice which he drinks duly up, 
And sleeps till the night is o'er. 
For one moment I wait : I look at 
him straight, 
And tell him for once how much 
I detest him : 
t Uivve no fear least he should hear, 



The drug he hath drained hath so 
oppresl him. 
Then, (ing(!r on lip, away I slip. 
And down the hills, till I reach the 
stream : [pear, 

I call to thee clear, till the boat ap- 
And Ave sail together through dark 
and dream. 
And sweet it is, in this Isle of Fays, 
To wander at will througli a garden 
of (ioweis. 
While the llowers that bloom, and 
the lamps that blaze. 
And the very nightingales seem 
ours ! [ways 

And sweeter it is, in the winding 
Of the waltz, while the music falls 
in showers, 
While the minstrel plays, and the 

moment stays, \ 

And the sweet brief rapture of | 

love is ours I i 

" But the night is far spent ; and 
before the (irst rent 
In yon dark blue sky overhead. 
My husband will wake, and the spell 
will bi'eak. 
And peril is near," . . . she said. 
" For if he should wake, and not find 

me, 
By bower and brake, thorough bush 
and tree, 
lie will come to seek me here ; 
And the Palace of Fays, in one vast 
blaze, 
Will sink and disappear ; 
And the nightingales will die in the 
vales, 
And all Avill be changed and 
dreaj- ! 
For the fays and elves can take care 
of themselves : 
They will slip on their slippers, 
and go : 
In their little green cloaks they will 
hide in the oaks. 
And the forests and brakes, for 
their sweet sakes. 
Will cover and keep them, I 
know, 



And the knights, with their spurs, 
and velvets and furs. 
Will take off their heads, each 
one. 
And to horse, and away, as fast as 
they may, 
Over brook, and bramble, and 
stone ; 
And each dame of the house has a 
little dun mouse. 
That will whisper her when to be 
' gone ; 
But we, my love, in this desolate 
grove, 
We shall be left alone ; 
And my husband will find us, take 
us and bind us : 
In his cave he will lock me up. 
And pledge me for spite in thy blood 
by night 
When he drains down his golden 
cup." 

" Thy husband, deai*, is a monster, 
'tis clear. 
But just now I will not tarry 
Thy choice to dispute — how on earth 
such a brute 
Thou hadst ever the fancy to 
marry. 
For wherefore, meanwhile, are we 
two here, 
In a fairy island under a spell, 
By night, in a magical atmosphere, 

In a lone enchanted dell, 
If we are to say and do no more 
Than is said and done by the dull 
daylight, 
In that dry old world, where both 
must ignore. 
To-morrow, the dream of to- 
night." 

Iler head drooped on my breast, 

Fair foolish little head ! 
Her lips to mine were prest. 

Never a word was said. 

If it were but a dream of the night, 
A dream that I dreamed in sleep — 

Why, then, is my face so white. 
And this wound so red and deep ? 



But whatever it was, it all took place 
In a land wliere never your steps 
will go. 
Though they wander, wherever they 
will, through space ; > 

In an hour you never will know, 
Though you should outlive the 
crow 
That is like to outlive your race. 

And if it were but a dream, it broke 
Too soon, albeit too late I woke. 
Waked by the smart of a sounding 
stroke 
Which has fo confused my wits, 
That I cannot remember, and never 

shall, 
What was the close of that festival, 
Nor how the Palace was shat- 
tered to bits : 
For all that, just now, I think I 

know. 
Is what is the force of an Ogre's 
blow. 
As my head, by starts and fits. 
Aches and throbs ; and, when I look 

round. 
All that I hear is the sickening 
sound 
Of the nurse's watch, and the doc- 
tor's boots. 
Instead of the magical fairy flutes ; 
And all that I see, in my love's lost 

place. 
Is that gin-drinking hag, with her 
nut- cracker face, 
By the earth's half-burned out 

wood : 
And the only stream is this stream 
of blood 
That flows from me, red and wide : 
Yet still I hear, — as sharp and clear, 
In the horrible, horrible silence out- 
side, 
The clock that stands in the empty 
hall, 
And talks to my soul of the flight of 
time ; 
With a face like a face at a fu- 
neral, 
Telling a tale too sad for rhyme : 



IN HOLLAND. 



265 



And still I hear, witli as little clieer, 
In the yet more liorrible silence 
inside, 
Chanted, perchance, by elves and 

fays. 
From some far island, out of my 
gaze, 
Where a house has fallen, and 
some one has died, 
That music, that music of other 
days, 
With its minstrelsy undescried ! 
For time, whicli surviveth every- 
thing, 
And Memory which surviveth 
Time :— 
These two sit by my side, and sing, 
A song too sad for rhyme. 



THE CANTICLE OF LOVE. 

I ONCE heard an angel, by night, in 
the sl\y. 
Singing softly a song to a deep 
golden lute : 
The polestar, the seven little planets, 
and I, 
To the song that he sung listened 
mute. 
For the song that he snng was so 
strange and so sweet. 
And so tender the tones of his 
lute's golden strings, 
That the Seraphs of Heaven sat 
husht at his feet, 
And folded their heads in their 
wings. 

And the song that he sung by those 
Seraphs up there 

Is called . . . "Love." But the 
words, I had heard them else- 
where. 

For, when I was last in the nether- 
most Hell, 
On a roclv 'mid the sulj)hm-ous 
surges, I heard 

A pale spirit sing to a wild hollow 
shell, 



And his song was the same, every 

word. 
But so sad was his singing, all Hell 

to the sound 
Moaned, and, wailing, complained 

like a monster in pain. 
While the fiends hovered near o'er 

the dismal profound. 
With their blacli wings weighed 

down by the strain. 

And the song that was sung by»the 
Lost Ones down there 

Is called . . . "Love." But the 
spirit that sung was Despair. 

When the moon sets to-night, I will 
go down to ocean. 
Bare my brow to the breeze, and 
my heart to its anguish ; 
And sing till the Siren with pining 
emotion 
(Unroused in her sea-caves) shall 
languish. 
And tlie Sylphs of the water shall 
crouch at my feet. 
With their white wistful faces 
turned upward to hear, 
And the soft Salamanders shall float, 
in the heat 
Of the ocean volcanoes, more near. 

For the song I have learned, all that 

listen shall move : 
But there's one will not listen, and 

that one I love. 



THE PEDLEK. 

Theee was a man, whom you might 
see. 
Toward nightfall, on the dusty 
track. 
Faring, footsore and wearily — 
A strong box on his back. 

A speck against the flaring sky. 
You saw him pass the line of 
dates. 

The camel-drivers loitering by 
From Bagdadt's dusking gates, 



2C6 



TITE WANDERER. 



The merchants from Bassora stared, 
And of his wares would (|iiestiou 
him. 

But, without answer, on he fared 
Into the evening dim. 

Nor only in the east : hut oft 

In northern lands of ice and snow. 

You might have seen, past field and 
croft. 
That figure faring slow. 

His cheek was worn ; his hack bent 
double 
Beneath the iron box he bore ; 
And in his walk there seemed such 
trouble, 
You saw his feet were sore. 

You wondered if he ever had 
A settled home, a wife, a child : 

You marvelled if a face so sad 
At any time had smiled. 

The cheery housewife oft would 
fling 
A pitying alms, as on he strode, 
Where, round the hearth, a rosy 
ring, 
Her children's faces glowed : 

In the dark doorway, oft the maid, 
Late-lingering on lier lover's arm. 

Watched through the twilight, half 
afraid. 
That solitary form. 

The traveller liailod him oft, . . . 
" Good night : 
The town is far : the road is lone : 
God speed ! " . . . already out of 
sight, 
The wayfarer was gone. 

But, Avhen the night was late and 
still. 

And the last star of all had crept 
Into his place above the hill, 

He laid him down and slept. 

His head on that strong box he laid : 
And there, beneath the star-cold 
skies. 

In slumber, I have heard it said, 
I'hej'e rose before his eyes 




A lovely dream, a vision fair. 
Of some f;u'-olT, forgotioii land, 

And of a gill with gdlden hair. 
And violets in her hand. 

He sprang to kiss her . . . "Ah . 
once more 
Return, beloved, and bring with 
thee 
The glory and delight of yore, — 
Lost evermore to me ! 

Then, ere she answered, o'er his 
back 
There fell a brisk and sudden 
stroke, — 
So sound and resolute a thwack 
That, with the blow, he woke . . . 

There comes out of that iron box 
An ngly hag, an angry crone ; 

Her crutch about his ears she 
knocks : 
She leaves him not alone : 

"Thou lazy vagabond ! come, budge. 
And carry me again," . . . she 
says : 
"Not liaif the journey's over . . . 
trudge I " 
. . . He groans, and he obeys. 

Oft in the sea he souglit to fling 
That iron box. But witches swim: 

And wave and wind were sure to 
bring 
The old hag back to him ; 

Who all the more about his brains 
Belabored him with such hard 
blows. 
That the poor devil, for his pains, 
Wished himself dead, heaven 
knows ! 

Love, is it thy hand in mine? . , . 
Behold ! 
I see the crutch uplifted high. 
The angry hag prepares to scold. 

O, yet «oe iniyld Good 

by I 



/// HOLLAND. 



267 



A GHOST STORY. 

I LAY awake past midnight : 
The moon set o'er the snow : 

The very cocks, for coldness, 
Could neither sleej) nor crow. 

There came to me, near morning, 

A woman pale and lair : 
She seemed a monarch's daughter, 

By the red gold romid her hair. 

The ring upon her finger 
Was one that well 1 know : 

I knew her fair face also, 
For I had loved it so ! 

But I felt I saw a spirit, 

And I was sore afraid ; 
For it is many and many a year 

Ago, since she was dead. 

I would have spoken to her. 
But I could not speak, for fear : 

Because it Avas a homeless ghost 
That walked beyond its spliere ; 

Till her head from her white shoul- 
ders 

She lifted up : and said . . . 
"Look in ! yunUlJind I'm holloio. 

Pray do not be afraid ! " 



SMALL PEOPLE. 

The warm moon was up in the sky, 
And the warm summer out on the 
land. 

There trembled a tear from her eye: 
There trembled a tear on my hand. 

Her sweet face I could not see clear, 
For the shade was so dark in the 
tree : 
I only felt touched by a tear, 
And I thought that the tear was 
for me. 

In her small car I whispered a word — 
With her sweet lips she laughed in 

my face 



And, as light through the leaves as a 
bird. 
She tlitled away from the place. 

Then she told to her sister, the 
Snake, 
All I said, and her cousin the 
Toad. 
The Snake slipped away to the brake, 
The Toad went to town by the 
road. 

The Toad told the Devil's coach- 
horse. 
Who cock'd up his tail at the 
news. 
The Snake hissed the secret, of 
coui-se, 
To the Newt, who was changing 
her shoes. 

The Newt drove away to the ball. 
And told it the Scorpion and Asp. 

The Spider, who lives in the wall, 
Overheard it, and told it the Wasp. 

The Wasp told the Midge and the 
Gnat : 
And the Gnat told the Flea and 
the Nit. 
The Nit dropped an egg as she sat : 
The Flea shrugged his shoulders, 
and bit. 

The Nit and the Flea are too small, 
And the Snake slips from under 
my foot : 

I wish I could find 'mid them all 
A man, — to insult and to shoot ! 



METEMPSYCHOSIS. 

She fanned my life out with her soft 
little sighs : 
She hushed me to death with her 
face so fair : 
I was drunk with the light of her 
wild blue eyes, 
And strangled dumb in her long 
gol4 hair. 



268 



THE WANDERER. 



So now I'm a blessed and wandering 

ghost, 
Though I cannot quite find out my 

way up to heaven : 
But I hover about o'er the long 

reedy coast, 
In the wistful light of a low red 

even. 

I have borrowed the coat of a little 
gray gnat : 
There's a small sharp song I have 
learned how to sing : 
I know a green place she is sm-e to 
be at : 
I shall light on her neck there, 
and sting, and sting. 

Tra-la-la, tra-la-la, life never pleased 
me ! 
I fly where I list now, and sleep at 
my ease. 
Buzz, buzz, buzz ! the dead only are 
free. 
Yonder's my way now. Give place, 
if you please. 

TO THE QUEEN OF SERPENTS. 

I TBTJST that never more in this 
world's shade 
Thine eyes will be upon me : never 
more 
Thy face come back to me. For 
thou hast made 

My whole life sore : 

And I might curse thee, if thou 
camest again 
To mock me with the memory in 
thy face 
Of days I would had been not. So 
much pain 

Hath made me base — 

Enough to wreak the wrath of years 
of wrong 
Even on so frail and weak a thing 
as thou ! 
Fare hence, and be forgotten. . . . 
Sing thy song, 

And braid thy brow, 



And be beloved, and beautiful, — 
and be 
In beauty baleful still ... a Ser- 
pent Queen 
To others not yet curst by kissing 
thee, 

As.I have been. 

But come not nigh me till my end 
be near. 
And I have turned a dying face 
toward heaven. 
Then, if thou wilt, approach, — and 
have no fear. 

And be forgiven. 

Close, if thou wilt, mine eyes, and 
smooth my hair : 
Fond words will come upon my 
parting breath. 
Nor, having desolated life, forbear 
Kind offices to death. 

BLUEBEARD. 

I "WAS to wed young Fatima, 
As pure as April's snowdrops are, 

In whose love lay hid my crooked 
life. 
As in its sheath my cimeter. 

Among the hot pomegranate boughs. 
At sunset, here alone we sat. 

To call back something from that 
hour 
I'd give away my Caliphat. 

She broke her song to gaze at me : 
Her lips she leaned my lips 
above . . . 

" Why art thou silent all this wliile. 
Lord of my life, and of my love ? " 

"Silent I am, young Fatima, 
For silent is my soul in me, 

And language loill not help the want 
Of that ivJdch cannot ever be." 

" But wherefore is thy spirit sad, 
My lord, my love, my life ? " . . . 
she said. 
"Because thy face is wondrous like 
The face of one J knew, that's 
dead," 



IN HOLLAND. 



269 



" Ah. cruel, cruel," cried Fatima, 
"That I should not possess the 
past ! 
What woman's lips first kissed the 
lips 
Where my kiss lived and lingered 
last ? 

"And she that's dead was loved by 
thee, 
That so her memory moves thee 
yet ? . . . 
Thy face grows cold and white, as 
looks 
The moon o'er yonder minaret ! " 

"^y, Fatima! I loved her well, 
With all of love's and life's de- 
spair, 

Or else I had not strangled her, 
That nUjht, in her own fatal hair." 

FATIMA. 

A YEAR ago thy cheek was bright, 
As oleander buds that break 

The dark of yonder dells by night 
Above the lamp-lit lake. 

Pale as a snowdrop in Cashmere 
Thy face to-night, fair infant, 
seems. 
Ah, wretched child ! What dost 
thou hear 
When I talk in my dreams ? 

GOING BACK AGAIK 

I DREAMED that I walked in Italy 
When the day was going down, 

By a water that flowed quite silently 
Through an old dim-lighted town : 

Till I came to a Palace fair to see : 
Wide open the windows were : 

My love at a window sat, and she 
Beckoned me up the stair. 

I roamed through many a coi-ridor 
And many a chamber of state : 

I passed through many an open door, 
While the day was growing late : 



Till I came to the Bridal Chamber at 
last. 
All dim in the darkening weather. 
The flowers at the window were talk- 
ing fast, 
And whispering all together. 

The place was so still that I could 
hear 
Every word that they said : 
They were whispering under their 
breath with fear. 
For somebody there was dead. 

When I came to the little rose-colored 
room. 
From the window there flew a bat. 
The wuidow was opened upon the 
gloom : 
My love at the window sat. 

She sat with her guitar on her knee, 
But she was not singing a note, 

For some one had drawn (ah, who 
could it be ?) 
A knife across her throat. 

THE CASTLE OF KING MAC- 
BETH. 

This is the castle of King Macbeth. 
And here he feasts — when the 
daylight wanes. 
And the moon goes softly over the 
heath — 
His Earls and Thanes. 

A hundred harpers with harps of gold 
Harp through the night high festi- 
val : 
And the sound of the music they 
make is rolled 
From hall to hall. 

They drink deep healths till the 
rafters rock 
In the Banquet Hall ; and the 
shout is borne 
To the courts outside, where the 
crowing cock 
Is waked ere morn. 



ijd 



TITE WANDERlLk. 



And the castle is all in a blaze of 
lislit 
From cresset, and torch, and 
sconce : and there 
Each warrior dances all the night 
With his lady fair. 

They dance and sing till the raven is 
stirred 
On the wicked elm-tree outside in 
the gloom : 
And the rustle of silken robes is 
heard 
From room to room. 

But there is one room in that castle 
old. 
In a lonely turret where jio one 
goes, 
And a dead man sits there, stark and 
cold, 
Whom no one knows. 



DEATH-IN-LIFE. 

Blest is the babe that dies within 

the womb. 
Blest is the corpse which lies within 

the tomb. 
And blest that death for Avhich this 

life makes room. 

But dreary is the tomb where the 

coipse lies : 
And wretched is the womb where 

the child dies : 
And curst that deatli which steals 

this life's disguise. 



KING LIMOS. 

TnEEE once was a wicked, old, gray 
king- 
Long damned, as I have reason to 
know, 
For he was buried (and no bad 
thing !) 
Hundreds of ycai's ago. 



His wicked old heart had grown so 
chilled 
That the leech, to warn him, did 
not shrink 
To give him each night a goblet, 
filled 
With a virgin's blood, to drink. 

"A splenetic legend," . . . you say, 
of course ! 
Yet there may be something in it, 
too. 
Kill, or be killed . . . which choice 
were the worse ? 
I know not. fcjolve it you. 

But even the wolf must have his 
prey : 
And even the gallows will have 
her food : 
And a king, my friend, will have his 
way, 
Though that way may lie through 
blood. 

My heart is hungry, and must be fed ; 

My life is empty, and must be filled ; 
One is not a Ghoul, to live on the 
dead : 

What then if fresh blood be spilled ? 

We follow the way that nature leads. 
What's the very first thing that we 
learn ? To devour. 
Each life the death of some other 
needs 
To help it from hour to hour. 

From the animalcule that swallows 
his friends. 
Nothing loath, in the wave as it 
rolls, 
To man, as we see him, this law 
ascends ; 
'Tis the same in the world of souls. 

The law of the one is still to absorb : 
To be absorbed is the other's lot : — 

The lesser orb by the larger orb, 
The weak by the strong . . . why 
not? 



IN HOLLAND. 



ifi 



My Avant's at the Avorst : so why 
should I siiare 
(Since just such a thing my want 
sujtplies) 
This little girl with the silky hair, 
And the love iu her two large eyes ? 



THE FUGITIVE. 

Therk is no quiet left in life, 
Not any moment brings me rest : 

Forevermore, from shore to shore, 
1 bear about a laden breast. 

I see new lands : I meet new men : 
1 learn strange tongues iu novel 
places. 
I cannot chase one phantom face 
That haunts me, spite of newer 
faces. 

For me the wine is poured by night. 
And deep enough to drown much 
sadness ; 
But from the cup that face looks up. 
And mirth and music tm'n to mad- 
ness. 

There's many a lip that's warm for 
me : 
Many a heart with passion hound- 
ing : 



Cut ah, my breast, when closest 
prost, 
Creeps to a cold step near me 
sounding. 

To this dark penthouse of the mind 

I lure the bat-winged Sleep in 

vain ; 

For on his wings a dream he brings 

That deepens all the dark with 

pain. 

I may write books which friends will 
praise, 
I may win fame, I may win treas- 
tire ; 
But hope grows less with each suc- 
cess, 
And pain grows more with every 
pleasure. 

The draughts I drain to slake my 
thirst 
But fuel more the infernal flame. 
There tangs a sting in everything : — 
The more I change, the more the 
same ! 

A man that flies before the pest, 
From wind to wind my course is 
whirled. 
This fly accurst stung lo first, 
And drove her wild across the 
world ! 



THE SHORE. 

Can it be women that walk in the sea-mist under the cliffs there ? 

"Where, 'neath a briny bow, creaming, advances the lip 
Of the foam, and out from the sand-choked anchors, on to the skiffs there, 

The long ropes swing through the sm-ge, as it tumbles ; and glitter, and 
drip. 

All the place iu a lurid, glimmering, emerald glory. 

Glares liUe a Titan world come back under heaven again : 

Yonder, up there, are the steeps of the sea-kings, famous in story ; 
But who are they on the beach ? They are neitlier women, nor men. 

• WIk) knows, are they the land's, or the water's, living creatures ? 

Born of the boiling; sea ? nurst in the seething storms ? 
"With their woman's hair dishevelled over tJieir stern male features. 
Striding, bare to the knee ; maguitied maritime forms ! 



272 THE WANDERER. 



They may be the mothers and wives, they maybe the sisters and daughters 
Of men on the dark mid-seas, alone in those blaclc-coiled hulls. 

That toil 'neatli yon white cloud, whence the moon will rise o'er the waters 
To-night, with her face on fire, if the wind in the evening lulls. 

But they may be merely visions, such as only sick men witness 

(Sitting as I sit here, filled with a wild regret), 
Framed from the sea's misshapen spume with a horrible fitness 

To the winds in which they walk, and the surges by which they are 
w^et : — 

Salamanders, sea-wolves, witches, Avarlocks ; marine monsters, 
Which the dying seaman beholds, when the rats are swimming away, 

And an Indian wind 'gins hiss from an unknown isle, and alone stirs 
The Ijroken cloud which burns on the verge of the dead, red day, 

I know not. All in my mind is confused ; nor can I dissever 

The mould of the visible world from ther shape of my thoughts in me. 

The Inward and Outward are fused : and, tlirough thein, murmur forever 
The sorrow whose sound is the wind, and the roar of the limitless sea. 



THE NORTH SEA. 

By the gray sand-hills, o'er the cold sea-shore ; where, dumbly peering, 

Pass the pale-sailed ships, scornfully, silently ; Avheeling and veering 

Swift out of sight again ; while the wind searches what it finds never, 

O'er the sand-reaches, bays, billows, blown beaches, — homeless forever ! 

And, in a vision of the bare heaven seen and soon lost again. 

Over the rolling foam, out in the mid-seas, round by the coast again, 

Hovers the sea-gull, poised in the wind above, o'er the bleak surges. 

In the green briny gleam, briefly revealed and gone ; . ■ . fieet, as emerges 

Out of the tumult of some brain where memory labors, and fretfully 

Moans all the night-long, — a wild winge'd hope, soon fading regretfully. 

Here walk the lost Gods o' dark Scandinavia, morning and even ; 

Faint pale divinities, realmless and sorrowful, exiled from Heaven ; 

Burthened with memories of old theogonies ; each ruined monarchy 

lloaming amazed by seas ol)livii>us of ancient feally. 

Never, again at the tables of Odin, in their lost Banquet Hall, 

Shall they from golden cups drink, hearing golden harps, harping high 

festival. 
Never praise bright-haired Freya, in Vingolf, for her lost loveliness ! 
Never, with vEgir, sail round cool moonlit isles of green wilderness ! 
Here on the lone wind, through the long twilight, when day is waning, 
Many a hopeless voice near the night is heard coldly complaining, 
Here, in the glimmering darkness, when winds are dropped, and not a 

seaman sings 
From cape or foreland, pause, and pass silently, forms of discrowned 

kings. 
With sweeping, floating folds of dim garments ; wandering in wonder 
Of their own aspect ; trooping towards midnight ; feeling for thunder. 




IN HOLLAND. 



273 



Here, in the afternoon ; while, in her father's boat, heavily laden, 
Mending the torn nets, sings np the bleak bay the Fisher-Maiden, 
I too, forlornly wandering, wandering, see, with the mind's eye. 
Shadows beside me, . . . (hearing the wave moan, hearing the wind 

sigh) , . . 
Shadows, and images balefully beautiful, of days departed : 

Sounds of faint footsteps, gleams of pale foreheads, make mc sad-hearted ; 

Sad for the lost, irretrievable sweetness of former hours ; 

Sad with delirious, desolate odors, from faded flowers ; 

Sad for the beautiful gold hair, the exquisite, exquisite graces 

Of a divine face, hopelessly unlike all other faces ! 

O'er the gray sand-hills (where I sit sullenly, full of black fancies). 
Nipt by the sea-wind, drenched by the sea-salt, little wild pansies 
Flower, and freshly tremble, and twinkle ; sweet sisterhoods, 
Lone, and how lovely, with their frail green stems, and dark purple 

hoods ! 
Here, even here in the midst of monotonous, fixt desolation, 
Nature has touches of tenderness, beaiities of young variation ; 
Where, O my heart, in tliy ruined, and desolate, desolate places. 
Springs there a floweret, or gleams there the green of a single oasis ? 
Hidden, it may be perchance, and I know it not . . . hidden yet invio- 
late. 
Pushes the germ of an unconscious rapture in me, like the violet 
Which, on the bosom of Marcli, the snows cover and keep till the coming 
Of April, the first bee shall find, when he wanders, and wekome it hum- 
ming. 
Teach me, thou North where the winds lie in ambush ; the rains and foul 

weather 
Are stored in the house of the storms ; and the snow-flakes are garnered 

together ; 
Where man's stern, dominate, sovereign intelligence holds in allegiance 
Whatever blue Sirius beholds on this Earth-ball, — all seas, and all regions ; 
The iron in the hill's heart ; the spirit in the loadstone ; the ice in the 

poles ; 
All powers, all dominions ; ships ; merchandise ; armaments ; beasts ; 

human souls ; . . . 
Teach me tliy secrets : teach to refrain, to restrain, to be still ; 
Teach me unspoken, steadfast endurance ; — the silence of Will ! 



A NIGHT IN THE FISHER- 
MAN'S HUT. 
PART I. 
THE FISHEKMAN'S DAUGHTER. 

If the wind had been blowing the 
Devil this way 
The midnight could scarcely have 
gi-own more unholy, 
18 



Or the sea liave found secrets more 
wicked to say 
To the tootliless old crags it is 
hiding there wholly. 

I love well the darkness. I love 
well the sound 
Of the thunder-drift, howling this 
way over ocean. 



274 



THE WANDERER. 



For 'tis though as in nature my 
spirit has found 
A trouble aliin to its own free 
emotion. 

Tlip, hoarse night may howl herself 
silent for me. 
When tlie silence comes, then 
comes the liowling witliin. 
I am drenched to my knees in the 
surf of tlie sea, 
And wet witli tlie salt bitter rain 
to the skin. 

Let it thunder and lighten ! this 
world's ruined angel 
Is but fooled by desire like the 
frailest of men ; 
Both seek in hysterics life's awful 
evangel, 
Then both settle down to life's si- 
lence again. 

Well I know the wild spirits of water 
and air, 
When the lean morrow turns up 
its cynical gray, 
Will, baffled, revert with familiar 
despair 
To their old listless work, in their 
old heli^less way. 

Tender's the light in the Fisher- 
man's hut ; 
But the old wolf himself is, I 
know, off at sea. 
And I see through the chinks, though 
the shutters be shut. 
By the lirelight that some one is 
watching for me. 

Three years ago, on this very same 
night, 
I walked in a ball-room of perfume 
and splendor 
With a pearl-bedecked lady below the 
lamplight : — 
Now I walk with the wild wind, 
whose breath is more tender. 

Hark ! the horses of ocean that 
crouch at my feet, 
They are moaning in impotent 
pain on the beach 1 



Lo ! the storm-light, that swathes in 
its blue winding-sheet 
That lone desert of sky, where the 
stars are dead, each ! 

Holloa, there I open, you little wild 
girl ! 
Hush, . . . 'tis her soft little feet 
o"er the floor. 
Stay not to tie up a single dark curl, 
But quick with the candle, and 
open the door. 

One kiss ? . . . thei-e's twenty ! . . . 
but first, take my coat there. 
Salt as a sea-sponge, and dripping 
all through. 
The old wolf, your father, is out in 
the boat there. 
Plark to the thunder ! . . . we're 
safe, — I and you. 

Put on the kettle. And now for the 
cask 
Of that famous old rum of your 
father's, the king 
Would have clawed on our frontier. 
There, till me the flask. 
All, what a quick, little, neat- 
handed thing ! 

There's my pipe. Stuff it with black 
negro-head. 
Soon I shall be in the cloud-land 
of glory. 
Faith, 'tis better with you, dear, 
than 'fore the mast-head. 
With such lights at the windows 
of night's upper story I 

Next, over the roimd open hole in 
. the shutter 
You may pin up your shawl, . . . 
lest a mermaid should peep." 
Come, now, the kettle's beginning to 
sjilutter, 
And the cat recomposes herself 
into sleep. 

Poor little naked feet, . . . put them 
up there . . . 
Little white foani-flnkes I and now 
the soft head, 



IN HOLLAND. 



27s 



Here, on my shoulder ; while all 
the dark hair 
Falls round us like sea-weed. 
What matter the bed 

If sleep will visit it, if kisses feel 
there 
Sweet as they feel under ctirtains 
of silk? 
So, shut your eyes, while the fire- 
light will steal there 
O'er the black bear-skin, the arm 
white as milk ! 

Meanwhile I'll tell to you all I re- 
member 
Of the old legend, the northern 
romance 
I heard of in Sweden, that sno-R^^ 
December 
I passed there, about the wild Lord 
Koseucrantz. 

Then, when you're tired, take the 
eards from the cupboard, . 
Thumbed over by every old thief 
in our crew. 
And I'll tell you your fortune, you 
little Dame Hubbard ; 
My own has been squandered on 
witches like you. 

Knave, King, and Queen, all the vil- 
lanous pack of 'em, 
I know what they're worth in the 
game, and have found 
Upon all the trump-cards the small 
mark at the back of 'em, 
The Devil's nail-mark, who still 
cheats us all round. 

PART II. 

THE LEGEND OF LORD KOSEN- 
CEANTZ. 

The lamps in the castle hall burn 
bright, 
And the music sounds, and the 
dancers dance. 
And lovely the young Queen looks 
to-night. 
But pale is Lord Kosencrantz. 



Lord Kosencrantz is always pale, 
But never more deadly pale than 
now . . . 
O, there is a whisper, an ancient 
tale, — 
A rumor, . . . but who should 
know ? 

He has stepped to the dais. He has 
taken her hand. 
And she gives it him with a tender 
glance. 
And the hautboys sound, and the 
dancers stand, 
And envy Lord Rozcncrantz. 

That jewelled hand to his lips he 
prest ; 
And lightly he leads her towa.rds 
the dance : 
And the blush on the youns Queen's 
cheek confest 
Her love for Lord Eosencrantz. 

The moon at the muUioned window 
shone ; 
There a face and a hand in the 
moonlight glance ; 
But that face and that hand were 
seen of none, 
Save only Lord Eosencrantz. 

A league aloof in the forest-land 
There's a dead black pool, where a 
man by chance 
. . . Again, again, that beckor.ing 
hand ! 
And it beckons Lord Eosencrantz. 

While the young Queen turned to 
whisper him, 
Lord Eosencrantz from the hall 
was gone ; 
And the hautboys ceased, and the 
lamj)s grew dim, 
And the castle clock struck One ! 



It is a bleak December night. 
And the snow on the highway 
gleams by fits : 
But the fire on the cottage-hearth 
burns bright. 
Where the little maiden sits. 



276 



THE WANDERER. 



Her spinning-wliecl she lias laid 
aside ; 
And lier blue eyes soft in the fire- 
light glance ; 
As she leans with love, and she leans 
with pride, 
On the breast of Lord Eosen- 
crantz. 

Mother's asleep, up stairs in bed : 
And the black cat, she looks won- 
drous wise 
As she licks her paws in the firelight 
red, 
And glares with her two green 
eyes : 

And the little maiden is half afraid. 
And closely she clings to Lord 
Kosencrantz ; 
For she has been reading, that little 
maid, 
All day, in an old romance, 

A legend wild of a wicked pool 
A league aloof in the forost-laiid. 

And a crime done there, and a sinful 
soul. 
And an awful face and hand. 

" Our little cottage is bleak and 
drear," 
Says the little maid to Lord Kosen- 
crantz ; 
" And this is the loneliest time of the 
year, 
And oft, when the wind, by 
chance, 

" The ivy beats on the window-pane, 

I wake to the sound in the gusty 

nights ; 

And often, outside, in the drift and 

rain. 

There seem to pass strange sights. 

" And O, it is dreary here alone ! 
When mother's asleep^ in bed, up 
stairs. 
And the black cat, tliere, to the 
forest is gone, 
— ^Look at her, how she glares t " 



" Thou little maiden, my heart's own 
bliss. 
Have thou no fear, for I love thee 
well ; 
And sweetest it is upon nights like 
this, 
"VYlien the wind, like the blast of 
hell, 

" Eoars up and down in the chimneys 
old, 
And the wolf howls over the distant 
snow, 
To ki.ss away both the night and the 
cold 
With such kisses as we kiss now." 

"Ah ! more than life I love thee, 
dear!" 
Says the little maiden with eyes so 
blue ; 
"And, when thou art near, I have 
no fear, 
Whatever the night may do. 

"But O, it is dreary when thou art 



away 



And in bed all night I pray for 

thee : 
Now tell me, thou dearest heart, and 

say. 
Dost tiiou ever pray for me ? " 

" Thou little maiden, I thank thee 
much. 
And well I would thou shouldst 
pray for me ; 
But I am a sinful man, and such 
As ill should pray for thee." 

Hist ! . . . was it a face at the win- 
dow past ? 

Or was it the ivy leaf, by chance, 
Tapping the pane in the fitful blast. 

That startled Lord Kosencrantz ? 

The little maid, she has seen it plain, 
For she shrieked, and down she 
fell in a swoon : 

3£utely it came, and went again, 
In the light of the winter moon. 



IN HOLLAND. 



2TJ 



The young Queen, — O, but her face 
■was sweet ! — 
She died on the night that she was 
■wed : 
And they laid her out in her ■wind- 
ing-sheet, 
Stark on her marriage-bed. 

The little maiden, she ■went mad ; 
But her soft blue eyes still smiled 
the same. 
With ever that ■wistful smile they 
had : 
Her mother, she died of shame. 

The black cat lived from house to 
house. 
And every night to the forest 
hied ; 
And she killed many a rat and 
mouse. 
Before the day she died. 

And do you wish that I should de- 
clare 
What Mas the end of Lord Kosen- 
crantz ? 
Ah ! look in my heart, you will find 
it there, 
— The end of the old romance I 



PART III. 
DAYBREAK. 

Yes, you have guessed it. The wild 
Kosencrantz, 
It is I, dear, the wicked one ; who 
but I, maiden ? 
My life is a tattered and worn-out 
romance, 
And my heart with the curse of 
the Past hath been laden : 

For still, where I wander or linger, 
forever 
Com?s a skeleton hand that is 
beckoning for me ; 
And still, dogging my footsteps, life's 
long Never-never 
Pursues me, wherever my footsteps 
I'lMy be : 



The star of my course hath been long 
ago set, dear ; 
And the wind is my pilot wher- 
ever he blows : 
He cannot blow from me what I 
would forget, dear, 
Nor blow to me that which I seek 
for, — repose. 

What ! if I were the Devil himself, 
would you cling to me, 
Bear my ill humors, and share my 
wild nights ? 
Crouch by me, fear me not, stay by 
me, sing to me. 
While the dark haunts us with 
sounds and with sights ? 

Follow me far away, pine not, but 
smile to me, 
Never ask questions, and always 
be gay ? 
Still the dear eyes meekly turned all 
the while to me. 
Watchful the night through, and 
l^atient the day ? 

What ! if this hand, that now strays 
through your tresses. 
Three years ago had been dabbled 
ill gore ? 
What ! if this lip, that your lip no^w 
caresses, 
A corpse had been pressing but 
three years before ? 

Well then, behold ! ... 'tis the 
gray light of morning 
That breaks o'er the desolate wa- 
ters . . . and hark ! 
'Tis the first signal shot from my 
boat gives me warning : 
The dark moves away : and M'ol- 
low the lark. • 

On with your hat and your cloak ! 
you are mine, child. 
Mine and the fiend's that pursues 
me, henceforth ! 
We must be far, ere day breaks, o'er 
the brine, child : 
It may be south I go, it may be 
north. 



278 



THE WANDERER. 



What ! really fetching your hat and 
your cloak, dear ? 
Sweet little fool. Kiss me quick 
now, and laugh ! 
All I have said to you was hut a joke, 
dear : 
Half was in folly, in wantonness 
half. 

PART IV. 
BKEAKFAST. 

Ay, maiden : the whole of my story 
to you 
Was but a deception, a silly ro- 
mance : 
From the first to the last word, no 
word of it true ; 
And my name's Owen Meredith, 
not Rosencrantz. 

I never was loved by a Queen, I de- 
clare ; 
And no little maiden for me has 
gone mad : 
I never committed a murder, I 
swear ; 
And I probably should have been 
hanged if I had. 

I never have sold to the Devil my 
soul ; 
And but small is the price he 
would give me, I know : 
I live much as other folks live, on 
the whole : 
And the worst thing in me's my 
digestion . . . heigh ho ! 

Let us leave to the night-Avind the 
thoughts which he brings, 
And leave to the darkness the 
-^powers of the dark ; 
F(ir my hopes o'er the sea lightly 
flit, like the wings 
Of the curlews that liover and 
poise round my bark. 

Leave the wind and the water to 
mutter together 
Their weird metaphysical grief, as 
of old, 



For day's business begins, and the 
clerk of the weather 
To the powers of the air doth his 
l^urpose unfold. 

Be you sure those dread Titans, 
whatever they be, 
That sport with this ball in the 
great courts of Time, 
To play practical jokes upon you, 
dear, and me, 
Will never desist from a sport so 
sublime. 

The old Oligarchy of Greece, now 
abolished, 
Were idle aristocrats fond of the 
arts. 
But though thus refined, all their 
tastes were so polished. 
They were tm-bulent, dissolute 
gods, without hearts. 

They neglected their business, they 
gave themselves airs, 
Eead the poets in Greek, sipped 
their wine, took their rest. 
Never troubling their beautiful 
heads with affairs, 
And as for their morals, the leas), 
said, the best. 

The scandal grew greater and great- 
er : and then 
An appeal to the people was for- 
mally made. 

The old gods were displaced by the 
sirtfrage of men. 

And a popular government formed 
in their stead. 

But these are high matters of state, — 
I and you 
May be thankful, meanwhile, we 
have something to eat, 
And nothing, just now, more impor- 
tant to do. 
Than to sit down at once, and say 
grace before meat. * 

You may boil me some coffee, an 
egg, if it's handy. 
The sea's rolling mountains just 
now. I shall wait 



IN HOLLAND. 



279 



For King Neptune's mollissima tem- 
pora fandi, 
Wlio will presently lift up his 
curly white pate, 

Bid Eurus and Kotus to mind their 
own business, 
And make me a speech in Hexa- 
meters slow ; 
While I, by the honor elated to diz- 
ziness, 
Shall yield him my offerings, aud 
make him my bow. 



A DREAM. 

I HAD a quiet dream last night : 
For I dreamed that I was dead ; 

Wrapped around in my grave-clothes 
white. 
With my gravestone at my liead. 

I lay in a land I liave not seen. 
In a place I do not know. 

And the grass was deathly, deathly 
green 
T\Tiich over my grave did grow. 

The place was as still as still could 
be, 
With a few stars in tlie sky, 
And an ocean Avhose waves I could 
not see, 
Though I heard them moan hai-d 
by. 

There was a bird in a branch of yew, 

Building a little nest. 
The stars looked far and very few. 

And I lay all at rest. 

There came a footstep through the 
grass. 

And a feeling through the mould : 
And a woman pale did over me pass. 

With hair like snakes of gold. 

She read my name iipon my grave : 
She read my name with a smile. 

A wild moan came from a wandering 
wave, 
But the stars smiled all the wliile. 



The stars smiled soft. That woman 
pale 

Over my grave did move, 
Singing all to herself a tale 

Of one that died for love. 

There came a sparrow-hawk to the 
tree. 

The Utile bird to slay : 
There came a ship from over the sea. 

To take that woman away. 

The little bird I wished to save. 
To finish bis nest so sweet : 

But so deep I lay within my grave 
That I could not move my feet. 

That woman pale I wislied to keep 
To finish tlie tale I lieard : 

But within my grave I lay so deep 
That I could not speak a word. 

KING SOLOMON. 

King Solomon stood, in his crown 

of gold. 
Between the pillars, before the 

altar 
In the House of the Lord. And tlie 

King was old. 
And hfs strength began to falter, 
So that he leaned on his ebony staff, 
Sea,led with the seal of the Pente- 

graph. 

All of the golden fretted work. 
Without and within so rich and 
rare. 
As high as the nest of the building 
stork, 
Those i^illars of cedar were : — 
Wrought up to the brazen chapiters 
Of the Sidonian artificers. 

And the King stood still as a carve 1. 
king, 
The carven cedarn beams below, 
In his i)urple robe, with his signet- 
ring, 
And his beard as white as snow, 
And his face to ths Oracle, where 

I he liynin 
Dies under the wing of the cherubim. 



The wings fold over the Oracle, 
And cover the heart and eyes of 

God : 
The Spouse with pomegranate, lily, 

and bell, 
Is glorious in her abode ; 
For with gold of Ophir, and scent of 

myrrh. 
And purple of Tyre, the King clothed 

her. 

By the soul of each slumbrous instru- 
ment 
Drawn soft through, the musical 
misty air, 

The stream of the folk that came 
and went, 
For worship, and praise, and 
prayer, 

Flowed to and fro, and up and down. 

And round the King in his golden 
crown. 

And it came to pass, as the King 
stood there. 
And looked on the house he had 
built, with pride. 

That the Hand of the Lord came 
unaware, 
And touched him ; so that he died. 

In his p\irple robe, with his signet- 
ring. 

And the crown wherewith they had 
crowned him king. 

And the stream of the folk that 

came and went 
To worship the Lord with prayer 

and praise. 
Went softly ever, in wonderment. 

For the King stood there always ; 
And it was solemn and strange to 

behold 
That dead king crowned with a 

crown of gold. 

For he leaned on his ebony staff up- 
right ; 
And over his shoulders the purple 
robe ; 

And his hair and his beard were 
both snojv-white 



^ind the fear of him filled the 

globe ; 
So that none dared touch him, 

though he was dead, 
lie looked so royal about the head. 

And the moons were changed : and 

the years rolled on : 
And the new king reigned in the 

old king's stead : 
And men were maiTied and buried 

anon ; 
But the King stood, stark and 

dead ; 
Leaning upright on his ebony staff ; 
Preserved by the sign of the Pente- 

graph. 

And the stream of life, as it went 

and came. 
Ever for worship and praise and 

prayer, 
Was awed by the face, and the fear, 

and the fame 
Of the dead king standing there ; 
For his hair was so white, and his 

eyes so cold, 
That they left him alone wilh his 

crown of gold. 

So King Solomon stood up, dead, in 

Ihe House 
Of the Lord, held there by the 

Pentegraph, 
Until out from a pillar there ran a 

red mouse. 
And gnawed through his ebony 

staff : 
Then, flat on his face, the King fell 

down : 
And they picked from the dust a 

golden crown.* 



* My knowledge of the Rabbinical legend 
which suggested this roe m is one among 
the many debts I owe to my friend Itobert 
Browning. I hope these lines may remind 
him of hours which his society rendered 
precious and delighif iil to me, and which 
are among the most pleasant memories of 
my life. 



IN HOLLANb. 



2S1 



CORDELIA. 

Though thou never hast sought to 

divine it, 
Though to know it thou hast not a 

care, 
Yet my heart can no longer coniine 

it. 
Though my lip may be blanched to 

declare 
That I love thee, revere thee, adore 

thee, 

my dream, my desire, my despair ! 
Though in life it may never be given 
To my heart to repose upon thine ; 
Though neither on earth, nor in 

heaven, 
May the bliss I have dreamed of be 

mine ; 
Yet thou canst not forbid me, in 

distance. 
And silence, and long lonely years. 
To love thee, despite thy resistance. 
And bless thee, despite of my tears. 

Ah me, couldst thou love me ! . . . 

Believe me. 
How I hang on the tones of thy voice ; 
How the least sign thou slghest can 

grieve me, 
The least smile thou smilest rejoice : 
In thy face, how I watch every shade 

there ; 
In thine eyes, how I learn every 

look ; 
How the least sigh thy spirit hath 

made there 
My heart reads, and writes in its 

book ! 

And each day of my life my love 
shapes me 

From the mien that thou wearest, 
Beloved. 

Thou hast not a grace that escapes 
me, 

Nor a movement that leaves me un- 
moved. 

1 live but to see thee, to hear thee ; 

I count but the hours where thou 
art ; 



I ask — only ask — to be near thee, 
Albeit so far from thy heart. 

[n my life's lonely galleries never 
Will be silenced thy lightest foot- 
fall : 
For it lingers, and echoes, forever 
Until Memory mourning o'er all. 
All thy fair little footsteps are 

bright 
0"er the dark troubled spirit in me, 
As the tracts of some sweet water- 
sprite 
O'er the heaving and desolate sea. 
And, though cold and unkind be 

thine eyes. 
Yet, unchilled their unkindness be- 
low, 
In my heart all its love for thee lies, 
Like a violet covered by snow. 

Little child ! . . . were it mine to 
Avatch o'er thee. 

To guide, and to guard, and to 
soothe ; 

To shape the long pathway before 
thee, 

And all that was rugged to smooth; 

To kneel at one bedside by night, 

And mingle our souls in one prayer; 

And, awaked by the same morning- 
light. 

The same daily duties to share ; 

Until Age with his silver dimmed 

slowly 
Those dear golden tresses of thine ; 
And Memory rendered thrice holy 
The love in this poor heart of mine ; 

Ah, never . . . (recalling together. 
By one hearth, in our life's winter 

time. 
Our youth, with its lost summer 

weather. 
And our love, in its first golden 

prime), 
Should those loved lips have cause 

to record 
One word of unkindness from me, 
Or my heart cease to bless the least 

word 



282 



THE WANDERER. 



Of kindness once spoken by thee ! 
But, whatever my path, and what- 
ever 
The future may fashion for thine, 
Thy life, O believe me, can never. 
My beloved, be iuditterent to mine. 
When far from tlie sight of thy 

beauty, 
Pursuing, unaided, alone, 
Tlie path of man's difficult duty 
In the land where my lot m.ay be 

thrown ; 
When my steps move no more in the 

place 
Where thou art : and the brief days 

of yore 
Are forgotten : and even my face 
In tliy life is remembered no more ; 
Yet in my life will live thy least 

feature ; 
I shall mourn the lost light of thine 

eyes ; 
And on earth there will yet be one 

nature 
That must yearn after thine till it 

dies. 

"YE SEEK JESUS OF NAZ- 
ARETH WHICH WAS CRU- 
CIFIED : HE IS RISEN : HE IS 
NOT HERE." 

Mark xvi. 6. 

If Jesus came to eartli again. 
And walked, and talked, in field, 
and street, 

Wlio would not lay his human pain 
Low at those heavenly feet ? 

And leave the loom, and leave the 

lute, 

And leave the volume on the 

slielf, [mute. 

To follow Him, unquestioning. 

If 'twere the Lord himself ? 

How many a brow with care o'er- 
worn, 
How many a heart with grief o'er- 
laden. 
How many a youth with love for- 
lorn. 
How many a mourning maiden, 



Would leave the baffling earthly 
prize 
Wliicli fails the earthly, weak en- 
deavor. 
To gaze into those lioly eyes. 
And drink content forever ! 

Tlie mortal liope, I ask with tears 
Of Heaven, to soothe this mortal 
pain, — 
The dream of all my darlvcned 
years, — 
I sliould not cling to them. 

The pride that prompts the bitter 
jest— 
(Sharp styptic of a bleeding he.art!) 
Would fail, and humbly leave con- 
fest 
The sin that brought the smart, 

If I might croucli witliin the fold 
Of that white robe (a wounded 
bird) ; 

The face that Mary saw behold. 
And hear the words she heard. 

I would not ask one word of all 
That now my nature yearns to 
know ; — 

The legend of the ancient Fall ; 
The source of human woe : 

What liopes in other worlds may 
hide ; 
What griefs yet unexplored in 
tills ; 
How fares the spirit within the wide 
Waste ti"act of that abyss 

Whicli scares the heart (since all wo 
know 

Of life is only conscious sorrow) 
Lest novel life be novel woe 

In death's midawned to-morrow ; 

I would not ask one word of this, 
If I might only hide my head 

On that beloved breast, and kiss 
The wounds where Jesus bled. 



IN HOLLAND. 



283 



And I, where'er He went, would go, 
Nor question where the path 
might lead, 

Enough to know that, here helow, 
I walked with God indeed ! 

His sheep along the cool, the shade. 
By the still watercourse he leads. 

His lambs upon His breast are laid, 
His hungry ones He feeds. 

Safe in His bosom I should lie, 
Hearing, where'er His steps might 
be. 
Calm waters, murmuring, murmur- 
ing by, 
To meet the mighty sea. 

\i this be thus, O Lord of mine. 
In absence is Thy love forgot ? 

And must I, where I walk, repine 
Because I see Thee not ? 

If this be thus, if this be thus 
And our poor prayers yet reach 
Thee, Lord, 

Since we are weak, once more to us 
Eeveal the Living Word ! 

Yet is my heart, indeed, so weak 
My course alone I dare not trace ? 

Alas ! I know my heart must break 
Before I see Thy face. 

I loved, with all my human soul, 
A human creatiire, here below. 

And, though thou bad'st thy sea to 
roll 
Forever 'twixt us two, 

And though her form I may not see 
Through all my long and lonely 
life, 

And though she never now may be 
My helpmate and my wife, 

Yet in my dreams her dear eyes 
shine. 
Yet in my heart her face I bear, 
And yet each holiest thought of 
mine 
I seem with her to share. 



But, Lord, Thy face I never saw, 
Nor ever heard Thy human voice : 

My life, beneath an iron law. 
Moves on without my choice. 

No memory of a happier time, 
When in Thine arms, perchance, I 
slept. 

In some lost ante-natal clime, 
My mortal frame hath kept : 

And all is dark — before — hehind. 

I cannot reach Thee, where thou 
art, 
I cannot bring Thee to my mind, 

Nor clasp Thee to my heart. 

And this is why, by night and day. 
Still with so many an unseen tear 

These lonely lips have learned to 
pray 
That God would spare me here. 

While yet my doubtful course I go 
Along the vale of mortal years. 

By life's dull stream, that will not 
flow 
As fast as flow my tears, 

One human hand, my hand to take: 
One luunan heart, my own to 
raise : 

One loving hiunan voice, to break 
The silence of my days. 

Saviour, if this wild prayer be 
wrong. 
And what I seek I may not find, 
O, make more hard, and stern, and 
strong. 
The framework of my mind ! 

Or, nearer to me, in the dark 
Of life's low hours, one moment 
stand. 

And give me keener eyes to mark 
The moving of Thy hand. 

TO CORDELIA. 

I DO not blame thee, that my life 
Is lonelier now than even before ; 

For hadst thou been, indeed, my 
wife, 
(Vain dream that cheats no more I) 



284 



THE WANDERER. 



The fate, which from my earliest 

years [tread, 

Hatli made so dark the path I 

Had taiiglit thee too, perchance, 

such tears 

As I have learned to shed. 

And that fixed gloom, which souls 
like mine 
Are schooled to wear with stub- 
born pride, 
Had cast too dark a shade o'er 
thine, — 
Hadst thou been by my side. 

I blame thee not, that thou shouldst 
flee 
From paths where only weeds have 
si^rung, 
Though loss of thee is loss to me 
Of all that made youth young. 

For 'tis not mine, and 'twas not 
thine. 
To shape our course as first we 
strove : 
And powers which I coiild not com- 
bine 
Divide me from thy love. 

Alas ! we cannot choose our lives, — 
We can but bear the burthen 
given. 

In vain the feverish spirit strives 
With mirelenting heaven. 

For M'ho can bid those tyrant stars 
The injustice of their laws repeal ? 

Why ask who makes our prison bars. 
Since they are made of steel ? 

The star that rules my darkened 
hour 
Is fixt in reachless spheres on 
high : 
The curse which foils my baffled 
power 
Is scrawled across the sky. 

My heart knows all it felt, and feels: 
liut more than this I shall not 
know, 

Till he that made the heart reveals 
Why mine must suffer so. 



I only know that, never yet, 

My life hath found what others 

find,— 
That peace of heart which will not 

fret 
The fibres of the mind. 

I only know that not for me 
The human love, the clasp, the 
kiss ; 

My love in other worlds must be, — 
Why was I born in this ? 

The bee is framed to find her food 
In every wayside flower and bell, 

And build within the hollow wood 
Her own ambrosial cell : 

The spider hath not learned her art, 
A home in ruined towers to spin ; 

But what it seeks, my heart, my 
heart 
Is all unskilled to win. 

The world was filled, ere I was born. 
With man and maid, with bower 
and brake. 

And nothing but the barren thorn 
Eemained for me to take : 

I took the thorn, I wove it roimd, 
I made a piercing crown to wear : 

My own sad hands myself have 
crowned, 
Lord of ray own despair. 

That which we are, we are. 'Twere 
vain 
To plant with toil what will not 
grow. 
The cloud will break, and bring the 
rain. 
Whether we reap or sow. 

I cannot turn the thunder-blast, 
Nor pluck the levin's lurid root ; 

I cannot change the changeless past. 
Nor make the ocean mute. 

And if the bolt of death must fall 
Where, bare of head I walk my 
way, 

Why let it fall ! I will not call 
To bid the Thunderer stay. 



IN HOLLAND. 



285 



'Tis much to know, wliate'er betide 
The pilgrim path I pace alone, 

Thou wilt not miss me from thy side 
When its brief course is done. 

Hadst thou been mine, — when sliies 
were drear 
And waves were rough, for thy 
sweet sake 
I should have found in all some fear 
My inmost breast to shake : 

But now, his fill the blast may blow. 
The sea -may rage, the thunder 
roll, 

For every path by which I go 
Will reach the self-same goal. 

Too proud to fly, too weak to cope, 
I yet will wait, nor bow my head. 

Those who have nothing left to hope. 
Have nothing left to dread. 



A LETTER TO CORDELIA. 

' Perchance, on earth, I shall not 
see thee ever 
Ever again : and my unwritten 
years 
Are signed out by that desolating 
" Never," 
And blurred with tears. 

'Tis hard, so young — so young as I 
am still. 
To feel forevermore from life de- 
part 
All that can flatter the poor human 
will, 
Or fill the heart. 

Yet there was nothing in that sweet, 
and brief. 
And perisht intercourse, now 
closed for me. 
To add one thought unto my bitter- 
est grief 
Upbraiding thee. 

'Tis somewhat to have known, al- 
beit in vain, 
One woman in this sorrowful bad 
earth, 



Whose very loss can yet bequeath 
to pain 
New faith in worth. 

If I liavc overrated, in the wild 
Blind heat of hope, the sense of 
aught which hath 
From the lost vision of thy beauty 
smiled 
On my lone path, 

My retribution is, that to the last 
I have o'errated, too, my power to 
cope 
With this fierce thought . . . that 
life must all be past 
Without life's liope ; 

And I would bless the chauoe which 
let me see 
Once more the comfort of thy face, 
although 
It were with" beauty never born for 
me 
That face should glow. 

To see thee — all thou wilt be — loved 
and loving — 
Even though another's — in the 
years to come — 
To watch, once more, thy gracious 
sweetness moving 
Through its pure home, — 

Even this would seem less desolate, 
less drear, 
Than never, never to behold thee 
more — 
Never on those beloved lips to hear 
The voice of yore ! 

These weak words, O my friend, fell 
not more fast 
Than the weak scalding tears that 
with them fell. 
Nor tears, nor words came, when I 
saw thee last . . . 
Enough ! . . . Farewell. 

Farewell. If that dread Power 
which fashioned man 
To till this planet, free to searcli 
and find 



286 



THE WANDERER. 



The secret of his source as best he 
can, 
In his own mind, 

Hath any care, apart from that 
■\vliich moves 
Earth's myriads tlirough Time's 
ages as tliey roll, 
For any single human life, or loves 
One separate soul, 

May He, whose wisdom portions out 
for me 
The moonless, changeless mid- 
night of the heart, 
Still all his softest sunshine save for 
thee, 
Where'er thou art : 

And if, indeed, not any human eyes 
From human tears be free, — may 
Sorrow bring 
Only to Ihee her April-rain, whose 
sighs 
Soothe flowers in Spring. 

FAILURE. 

I HAVE seen those that wore Heav- 
en's armor worsted : 
I have heard Truth lie : 
Seen Life,beside the founts for which 
it thirsted. 
Curse God and die : 

I have felt the hand, whose touch 
was rapture, braiding 
Among my hair 
Love's choicest flowerets, and have 
found how fading 
Those gai-lands were :, 

I have watched my first and holiest 
hopes depart, 
One after one : 
I have held the hand of Death upon 
my heart, 
And made no moan : 

I have seen her whoiii life's whole 
sacrifice 
Was made to keep. 



Pass coldly by me with a stranger's 
eyes, 
Yet did not weep : 

Now even my body fails me ; and 
my brow 
Aches night and day : 
I am weak with over-work : how 
can I now 
Go forth and play ? 

What ! now that Youth's forgotten 
aspirations 
Are all no more, 
Eest there, indeed, all Youth's glad 
recreations, 
— An untried store ? 

Alas, what skills this heart of sad 
experience. 
This fi'anie o'erwrought. 
This memoiy with life's motion all 
at variance, 
This acliing thought ? 

How shall I come, with these, to 
follow pleasure 
Where otbers find it ? 
Will not their sad steps mar the 
merriest measure. 
Or lag behind it ? 

Still must the man move sadlier for 
the dreams 
That mocked the boy : 
And, having failed to achieve, must 
still, it seems, 
Fail to enjoy. 

It is no common failure, to have 
failed 
Where man hath given 
A whole life's effort to the task as- 
sailed — 
Spent earth on heaven. 

If error and if failure enter here, 
Wliat helps repentance ? 

Remember this, O Lord, in thy se- 
vere 
Last sentence ! 



IN HOLLAND. 



287 



MISANTHKOPOS. 

navra Kavx.% /cal TtavTo. yeAcDS Kai. vrarTa to 

Day's last light is dying out. 

All the place grows dim and drear: 
See ! the grisly bat' s about. 

There is nothing left to fear ; 
Little left to doubt. 

Not a note of music flits 

O'er the slackened harpstrings yon- 
der 
From the skeleton that sits 

By the brol<en harp, to ponder 
(While the spider knits 

Webs in each black socket-hole) 
Where is all the music fled. 

Music, hath it, then, a goal ? . . . 
Broken harp, and brainless head ! 

Silent song and soul ! 

Not a light in yonder slcy. 
Save that single wicked star, 

Leering with its wanton eye 
Through the shattered window- 
bar ; 

Come to see me die ! 

All. save this, the monstrous night 

Hath erased and blotted bare 
As the fool's brain . . . God's last 
light 
Winking at the Fiend's work 
there, — 
Wrong made worse by right ! 

Gone the voice, the face, of yore ! 

Gone the dream of golden hair ! 
Gone the garb that Falsehood wore ! 

Gone the shame of being bare ! 
We may close the door. 

All the guests are slunk away. 

Not a footstep on the stairs ! 
Not a friend here, left to say 

" Amen " to a sinner's prayers, 
If he cared to pray ! 

Gone is Fiiendship's friendliness, 

After Love's fidelity : 
Gone is honor in the mess 

Spat upon by Chai-ity : 
Faith has fled Distress 



Those grim tipstaves at the gate 
Freely may their work begin. 

Let them in ! they shall not wait. 
There is little now within 

Left for Scorn and Hate. 

O, no doubt the air is foul ! 

'Tis the last lamp spits and stinks. 
Shuddering downward in the bowl 

Of the socket, from the brinks. 
What's a burned-out soul ? 

Let them all go, unreproved ! 

For the source of tears is dried. 
What ! . . . One rests ? . . . hath 
nothing moved 

That pale woman from my side. 
Whom I never loved ? 

You, with those dim eyes of yours, 
Sadder than all eyes save mine ! 

That dim forehead which immures 
Such faint helpless griefs, that 
pine 

For such hopeless cures ! 

Must you love me, spite of loathing ? 

Can't you leave me where I'm ly- 
ing ? 
O, . . . you wait for our betrothing ? 

I escape you, though, — by dying ! 
Lay out my death-clothing. 

Well I would that your white face 
Were abolisht out of sight, 

With the glory and the grace 
Swallowed long ago in night, — 

Gone, — without a trace ! 

Reach me down my golden harp. 

Set it here, beside my knee. 
Never fear that I shall warp 

All the chords of ecstasy, 
Striking them too sharp ! 

Crown me with my crown of flowers 

Faded roses every one ! 
Pluckt in those long-perisht bowers, 

By the nightshade overrun, — 
Fit for brows like ours ! 

Fill me, now, my golden cup. 

Pour the black wine to the brim . 
Till within me, wMle I sup, 



288 



THE WANDEREk. 



All the fires, long quenched and 
dim, 
Flare, one moment, up. 

I will sing you a last song. 

I will pledge yoti a last health . . . 
Here's to weakness seeming strong ! 

Herets to Want that follows 
Wealth ! 
Here's to Right gone Avrong ! 

Curse me now the Oppressor's rod, 
And the meanness of the weak ; 

And the fool that apes the nod ; 
And the world at hide and seek 

With the wrath of God. 

Dreams of man's unvalued good. 
By mankind's unholy means ! 

Curse the people in their mud ! 
And the wicked Kings and Queens, 

Lying by the Rood. 

Fill ! to every plague . . . and first, 
Love, that breeds its own decay ; 

Rotten, ere the blossom burst. 
Next, the friend that slinks away. 

When you need him worst. 

O the world's inhuman ways I 
And the heartless social lie ! 

And the coward, cheapening praise ! 
And the patience of the sky. 

Lighting such bad days 1 



Curs(?d be the heritage 

Of the sins we have not sinned I 
Curse'd be this boasting age, 

And the blind that lead the blind 
O'er its creaking stage ! 

O the vice within the blood, 
And the sin within the sense ! 

And the fallen angelhood, 

With its yearnings, too immense 

To be understood ! 

Curse the hound with beaten hide, 
When he turns and licks the 
hand. 

Curse this woman at my side ! 
And the memory of the land 

Where my first love died. 

Curse'd be the next and most 

(With whatever curse most kills). 

Me ... the man whose soul is lost ; 
Fouled by each of all these ills, — 

Filled with death and dust ! 

Take away the harp of gold, 
And the empty wine-cup too. 

Lay me out : for I grow cold. 
Tl)ere is something dim in view. 

Which must pass imtold : — 

Something dim, and something 
vast, — 

Out of reach of all I say. 
Language ceases . . . hiisht, aghast. 

What am I, to curse or pray ? 
God succeeds at last ! 



BOOK VI. — PALINGENESIS. 



A PRAYER. 

My Saviour, dare I come to Thee, 
Who let the little children come ? 
But I ? . . . my soul is faint in me 1 
I come from wandering to and fro 
This weary world. There still his 

round 
The Accuser goes : but Thee I 

found 



Not anywhere. Both joy and woe 
Have passed me by. I am too weak 
To grieve or smile. And yet I know 
That tears lie deep in all I do. 
The homeless that are sick for home 
Are not so wretched. Ere it break, 
Receive my heart ; and for the sake, 
Not of my sorrows, but of Thine, 
Bend down Thy holy eyes on mine, 
Which are too full of misery 



PALINGENESIS. 



289 



To see Thee clearly, thougli they 

seek. 
Yet, if I heard Thy voice say . . . 

" Come," 
So might I, dying, die near Thee. 
It shames me not, to have passed by 
The temple-doors in every street 
Where men profaned Thee : but 

that 1 
Have left neglected, choked with 

weeds, 
Defrauded of its incense sweet 
From holy thoughts and loyal 

deeds. 
The fane Thou gavest me to en- 
shrine 
Thee in, this wretched heart of 

mine. 
The Satyr there hath entered in ; 
The Owl that loves the darkened 

hoiu" ; 
And obscene shapes of night and 

sin 
Still haunt, where God designed a 

bower 
For angels. 

Yet I will not say 
How oft I have aspired in vain, 
How toiled along the rugged way, 
And held my faith above my pain, 
For this Thou knowest. Thou 

knowest when 
I faltered, and when I was strong ; 
And how from that of other men 
My fate was different : all the 

wrong 
Which devastated hope in me : 
The ravaged years ; the excited 

heart. 
That found in pain its only part 
Of love : the master misery 
That shattered all my early years. 
From which, in vain, I sought to 

flee : 
Thou knowest the long repentant 

tears, 
Thou heard' st me cry against the 

spheres. 
So sharp my anguish seemed to be I 
AH this Thou knowest. Though I 

shculd keep 

19 



Silence, Thou knowest my hands 

were free 
From sin, when all things cried to 

me 
To sin. Thou knowest that, had I 

rolled 
My soul in hell-flame fifty-fold. 
My sorrow could not be more deep. 
Lord ! there is nothing hid from 

Thee. 

EUTHANASIA. 

(WRITTEN AFTEK A SEVERE ILLNESS.) 

Spking to the world, and strength 
to me, returns ; 
And flowers return, — but not the 
flowers I knew. 
I live : the fire of life within me 
burns ; 
But all my life is dead. The land 
I view 
I know not ; nor the life which I re- 
gain. 
Within the hollow of the hand of 

death 
I have lain so long, that now I 
draw^ the breath 
Of life as unfamiliar, and with pain. 

Of life : but not the life which is no 
more ; — 
That tender, tearful, warm, and 
passionate thing ; 
That wayward, restless, wistful life 
of yore : 
Which now lies, cold, beneath the 
clasp of Spring, 
As last year's leaves : but such a life 
as seems 
A strange new-comer, coy and all- 
afraid. 
No motion leaves the heart where 
it is laid. 
Save when the past returns to me in 
dreams. 

In dreams, like memories of another 
world : 
The beauty, and the passion, and 

the pain. 



290 



THE WANDERER. 



The wizardry by which my youth 
was whirled 
Round vain desires, — so violent, 
yet so vain ! 
The love which desolated life, yet 
made 
So dear its desolation : and the 

creeds 
Which, one by one, snapped in ray 
hold like reeds, 
Beneath the weight of need upon 
them laid ! 

For each man dreams his own sand- 
house secure 
While life's wild waves are lulled; 
yet who can say, 

If yet his faith's foundations do en- 
dure, 

It is not that no wind hath blown 
that way ? 

Must we even for their beauty's 
sake, keep furled 

Our fairest creeds, lest earth should 
sully them. 
And take what ruder help chance 
sends, to stem 

The rubs and wrenchings of this 
boisterous world ? 

Alas ! 'tis not the creed that saves 
the man : 
It is the man that justifies the 
creed : 
And each must save his own soul as 
he can, 
Since each is burthened with a 
different need. 
Round eacli the bandit passions 
lurk ; and, fast 
And furious, swarm to strip the 

pilgrim bare ; 
Then, oft, in lonely places im- 
aware, 
Fall on him, and do murder him at 
last. 

And oft the light of truth, which 
through the dark 
We fetched such toilful compass 
to detect, 



Glares through the broken cloud on 
the lost bark. 
And shows the rock — too late, 
when all is wrecked ! 
Not from one watch-tower o'er the 
deep, alone, 
It streams, but lightens there and 

lightens here 
With lights so nmnberless (like 
heaven's eighth sphere) 
That all their myriad splendors seem 
but one. 

Time was, when it seemed jJossible 
to be 
(Then, when this shattered prow 
first felt the foam) 
Columbus to some far Philosophy, 
And bring, percliance, the golden 
Indies home. 
O siren isles of the enchanted main 
Through which I lingered ! altars, 
temples, groves. 
Whelmed in the salt sea wave, that 

rolls and roves 
Around each desolated lost domain ! 

Over all these hath passed the deluge. 
And, 
Saved from the sea, forlornly face 
to face 
With the gaunt ruin of a world, I 
stand. 
But two alone of all that pei-isht 
race 
Sm-vive to share with me my w,an- 
derings ; 
Doubt and Experience. These 

my steps attend, 
Ever ; and oft above my harp they 
bend. 
And, weeping with me, weep among 
its strings. 

Yet, — saved, though in a land un- 
consecrate 
By any memory, it seems good to 
me 
To build an altar to the Lord ; and 
wait 
Some token, either from the land 
or sea. 




" For each man deems his own sand-house secure.' 



PALINGENESIS. 



291 



To point me to my rest, which 
should be near. 
Kude is the work, and simple is 

my skill ; 
Yet, if tlie hand could answer to 
the will, 
This pile should lack not incense. 
Father, hear 

My cry unto thee. Make tby. cov- 
enant 
Fast with my spirit. Bind witliin 
Thy bow 
The whole horizon of my tears. I 
pant 
For Thy refreshing. Bid Thy 
fountains flow 
In this dry desert, where no springs 
I see. 
Before I venture in an unknown 

land, 
Here will I clear the ground on 
whicli I stand, 
And justify the hope Thou gavest 
me. 

I cannot make quite clear what 
comes and goes 
In fitful light, by waning gleams 
descried. 
The Spirit, blowing where it listeth, 
blows 
Only at times, some single fold 
aside 
Of that great veil which hangs o'er 
the Unknown : 
Yet do the feeble, fleeting lights 

that fall. 
Reveal enough, in part, for hope in 
all: 
And that seems surest which the 
least is shown. 

God is a spirit. It is also said 
Man is a spirit. Can I therefore 
deem 
The two in nature separate? The 
made 
Hath in it of the Maker, Hence I 
seem 
A step towards light ; — since 'tis the 
property 



Of spirit to possess itself in all 
It is possest by ; — halved yet in- 
tegral ; 
One person, various personality. 

To say the Infinite is that which lies 
Beyond the Finite, . . . were it 
not to set 
A border mark to the immensities ? 
Far as these mortal senses measure 
yet 
Their little region of the mighty 
plan. 
Through valves of birth and death 

— are heard forever 
The finite steps of infinite en- 
deavor 
Moving through Natm-e and the 
mind of man. 

If man, — the finite spirit, — in in- 
finity 
Alone can find the truth of his 
ideal. 
Dare I not deem that infinite Div- 
inity 
Within the finite must assume the 
real? 
For what so feverish fancy, reckless 
hurled 
Through a ruined brain, did ever 

yet descry 
A symbol sad enough to signify 
The conscious God of an unconscious 
world ? 

Wherefore, thus much perceived, to 
recognize 
In God, the infinite spirit of Unity, 
In man, the finite spirit, here implies 
An interchanged perception ; — 
Deity 
Within humanity made manifest : 
Not here man lonely, there a lonely 

God ; 
But, in all paths by hmnan nature 
trod. 
Infinity in Finity exprest. 

This interchange, upon man's part, 
I call 
Heligion : revelation on the part 



202 



THE WANDERER. 



Of Deity : wherefrom there seems to 
fall 
'Tis consequence (the point from 
which I start) 
If God and man he one (a imity 
Of ■which religion is the hmuan 

side) 
This must in man's religion he 
descried, 
A consciousness and a reality. 

"Whilst man in nature dwells, his 
God is still 
In nature ; thence, in time, there 
intervenes 
The Law : he learns to fortify his 
will 
Against his passions, by external 
means : 
And God becomes the Lawgiver : but 
when 
Corruption in the natural state we 

see. 
And in the legal hopeless tyranny. 
We seem to need {if needed not till 
then) 

That which doth uplift nature, and 
yet makes 
More light the heavy letter of the 
law. 
Then for the Perfect the Imperfect 
aches, 
Till love is born upon the deeps of 
awe. 
Yet what of this, . . . that God in 
man may be, 
And man, though mortal, of a 

race divine. 
If no assurance lives which may 
incline 
The heart of man to man's divinity ? 

"There is no God" ... the Fool 
saith — to his heart. 
Yet shapes a godhead from his in- 
tellect. 
Is mind than heart less human, . . . 
that we part 
Thought from affection, and from 
muid erect 
A deity merely intellectual ? 



If God there be, devoid of sym- 
pathy 
For man, he is not man's divinity. 
A God unloving M-ere no God at all. 

This felt, ... I ask not ... " What 
is God?" but "What 
Are my relations with Him ? " this 
alone 
Concerns me now : since, if I know 
this not, 
Though I should know the sources 
of tlie sun, 
Or what within the hot heart of the 
earth 
Lulls the soft spirit of the fire, 

although 
The mandate of the thunder I 
should know, 
To me my knowledge would be noth- 
ing Avorth. 

Wliat message, or what messenger to 
man ? 
Whereby shall revelation reach 
the soul ? 
For who, by searching, finds out 
God ? IIow can 
My utmost steps, miguided, gain 
the goal 
Of necessary knowledge ? It is clear 
I cannot reach the gates of heaven, 

and knock 
And enter : though I stood upon 
the rock 
Like Moses, God must speak ere I 
can hear. 

And touch me ere I feel him. He 
must come 
To me (I cannot join Him in the 
cloud), [home ; 

Stand at the dim doors of my mortal 
Lift the low latch of life ; and 
enter, bowed 
Unto this earthly roof ; and sit 
within 
The circle of the senses ; at the 

hearth 
Of the affections ; be my guest on 
eartli, 
liOTing my love, and sorrowing in 
my sin. 



PALINGENESIS. 



293 



Sinee, though I stripped Divinity, in 
thouglit, 
From passion, whicli is personal- 
ity, 
My God would still be human : 
though I sought 
In the bird's wing or in the in- 
sect's eye, 
Rather than in this broken heart of 
mine. 
His presence, human still: human 

would be 
All human tbought conceives. 
Humanity, 
Being less human, is not more divine. 

The soul, tben, cannot stipulate or 
refuse [bassy. 

The fashion of the heavenly em- 
Since God is here the speaker. He 
must choose 
The words He wills. Already I 
descry 
That God and man are one, divided 
here, 
Yet reconcilable. One doubt sur- 
vives. 
There is a dread condition to 
men's lives : 
We die : and, from its death, it 
would appear 

Our nature is not one with the 
divine. 
Not so. The Man-God dies ; and 
by his death 
Doth with his own immortal life 
combine 
The spirit pining in tins mortal 
breath. [ate 

Who from himself himyelf did alien- 
That he, returning to himself, 

might pave 
A pathway hence, to heaven from 
the grave, 
For man to follow— through the 
heavenly gate. 

Wert thou, my Christ, not ignorant 
of grief ? 
A man of sorrows ? Not for sor- 
row's sake 



(Lord, I believe : help thou mine un- 
belief !) 
Beneath the thorns did thy pure 
forehead ache : 
But that in sorrow only, unto sor- 
row, 
Can comfort come ; in manhood 

only, man 
Perceive man's destiny. In 
Nature's plan 
Our path is over Midnight to To- 
morrow. 

And so the Prince of Life, in dying, 
gave 
Undying life to mortals. Once he 
stood 
Among his fellows, on this side the 
grave, 
A man, perceptible to flesh and 
blood : 
Now, taken from our sight, he dwells 
no less 
Within our mortal memory and 

thought ; 
The mystery of all he was, and 
wrought, 
Is made a part of general conscious- 
ness. 

And in this consciousness I reach 
repose. 
Spent with the howling main and 
desert sand 
Almost too faint to pluck the unfad- 
ing rose 
Of peace, that bows its beauty to 
my hand. 
Here Reason fails, and leaves me ; 
iiTy pale guide 
Across the wilderness — by a stern 

command, 
Shut out, like Moses, from the 
Promist Land. 
Touching its own achievement, it 
hath died. 

Ah yet ! I have but wrung the vic- 
tory 
From Thought ! Not passionless 
will be my path. 



294 



THE WANDERER. 



Tet on my life's pale forehead I can 
see 
The flush of squandered fires. 
Passion hath 
Tet, in the pui-pose of my days, its 
place. 
But changed in aspect : turned 

unto the East, 
Whence grows the dayspring from 
on high, at least 
A finer fervor trembles on its face. 



THE SOUL'S SCIENCE. 

Can History prove the truth which 
hath 

Its record in the silent soul ? 
Or matliematics mete the path 

Whereby the spirit seeks its goal ? 

Can Love of aught but Love inherit 
The blessing which is born of 
Love ? 

The spirit knoweth of the spirit : 
The soul alone the soul can prove. 

The eye to see : the ear to hear : 
The working hand to help the 
will : 

To every sense his separate sphere : 
And unto each his several skill. 

The ear to sight, the eye to sound, 
Is callous : unto each is given 

His lorddom in his proper bound. 
The soul, the soul to find out 
heaven ! 

There is a glory veiled to sight ; 
A voice which never ear hath 
heard ; 
There is a law no hand can write, 
Yet stronger than the written 
word. 

And hast thou tidings for my soul, 
O teacher ? to my soul intrust 

Alone the purport of thy scroll : 
Or vex me not with learned dust. 



A PSALM OF CONFESSION. 

Full soon doth Sorrow make her 
covenant 
With Life ; and leave her shadow 
in the door : 
And all those future days, for which 
we pant. 
Do come in mourning for the days 
of yore. 
Still through the world gleams Mem- 
ory seeking Love, 
Pale as the torch which grieving 

Ceres bore, 
Seeking Proseri)ina, on that dark 
shore 
Where only phantoms through the 
twilight move. 

The more we change, the more is all 
the same. 
Our last grief was a tale of other 
years 
Quite outworn, till to our own hearts 
it came. 
Wishes are pilgrims to the Vale of 
Tears. 
Our brightest joys are but as airy 
shapes 
Of clou4, that fade on evening's 

glimmering slope ; 
And disappointment hawks the 
hovering hope 
Forever pecking at the painted 
grapes. 

Why can we not one moment pause, 
and cherish 
Love, though love turn to tears ? 
or for hope's sake 
Bless hope, albeit the thing we hope 
may perish ? 
For happiness is not in what we 
take. 
But what we give. What matter 
though the thing 
We cling to most should fail us ? 

dust to dust. 
It is tlie/ee//)i[/ for the thing, — the 
trust 
In beauty somewhei-e, to which souls 
should cling. 



PALINGENESIS. 



295 



My youth has failed, if failure lies 
in alight 
The warm heart dreams, or which 
the working hand 
Is set to do. I have failed in aidless 
thought, 
And steadfast purpose, and in self- 
command. 
I have failed in hope, in health, in 
love : failed in the word, 
And in the deed too I have failed. 

Ah yet, 
Alheit with eyes from recent weep- 
ings wet, 
Sing thou, my Soul, thy psalm unto 
the Lord ! 

The burthen of the desert and the 
sea I [vale ! 

The burthen of the vision in the 
My threshing-floor, my threshing- 
floor ! ah me, 
Thy wind hath strewn my corn, 
and spoiled the flail ! 
The bmtlien of Dumah and of Ded- 
anim ! 
What of the night, O watchman, 

of the night ? 
The glory of Kedar faileth : and 
the might 
Of mighty men is minish^d and dim. 

The morning cometh, and the night, 
he cries. 
The watchman cries the morning, 
too, is nigher. 
And, if ye would inquire, lift up 
yom- eyes. 
Inquire of the Lord, retm-n, in- 
quire ! 
I stand upon the watchtower all day 
long : [ward. 

And all the night long I am set in 
Is" it thy feet upon the moimtains, 
Lord? 
I sing against the darkness : hear 
my song ! 

The majesty of Kedar hath been 
spoiled : 
Bound are the arrows : broken is 
the bow. 



I come before the Lord with gar- 
ments soiled. 
The aslies of my life are on my 
brow. 
Take thou thy harp, and go about 
the city. 
O daughter of Desire, with gar- 
ments torn : 
Sing many songs, wake melody, 
and mourn, 
That thou uiay'st be remembered 
unto pity. 

Just, awful God ! here at thy feet I 
lay 
My life's most precious offering : 
dearly bought. 
Thou knowest with what toil by 
night and day : 
Thou knowest the pain, the pas- 
sion, and the thought. 
I bring thee my youth's failure. I 
have spent 
My youth upon it. All I have is 

here. 
Were it worth all it is not, price 
more dear 
Could I have paid for its accomplish- 
ment ? 

Yet it is much. If I could say to 
thee, 
" Acquit me, Judge ; for I am 
thus, and thus ; 
And have achieved — even so much," 
— should I be 
Thus wholly fearless and impetu- 
ous 
To rush into thy presence ? I might 
weigh 
The little done against the undone 

much : 
My merit with thy mercy : and, as 
such, 
Haggle with pardon for a price to 
pay. 

But now the fulness of its failure 
makes 
My spii-it fearless ; and despair 
grows bold. 



296 



7 HE WANDERER, 



"T 



My brow, beneath its sad self-knowl-: 
edge, aches. 
Life's presence passes Thine a 
thousand-fold 
In contemplated terror. Can I lose 
Aught by that desperate temerity 
Which leaves no choice but to sur- 
render Thee 
My life without condition ? Could I 
clioose 

A stipulated sentence, I might ask 
For ceded dalliance to sonie cher- 
isht vice : 
Or half-remission of some desperate 
task : 
Now, all I have is hateful. What 
is the price ? 
Speak, Lord ! I iiear the Fiend's 
hand at the door. 
Hell's slavery or heaven's service 

is it the choice ? 
How can I palter with the terms ? 
O voice, 
Whence do I hear thee . . . " Go : 
and sin no more'' ? 



No more, no more ? But I have kist 
dead white 
The cheek of Vice. No more the 
harlot hides 
Her loathsomeness of lineament from 
my sight. 
No more within my bosom there 
abides 
Her poisoned perfume. O, the 
witch's mice 
Have eat her scarlet robe and 

diaper, 
And she fares naked ! Part from 
her — from her ? 
Is this the price, O Lord, is this the 
price ? 

Yet, though her web be broken, 
bonds, I know. 
Slow custom frames in the strong 
forge of time. 
Which outlast love, and will not wear 
with woe. 
Nor break beneath the cognizance 
of crime. 



The witch goes bare. But he,— the 
fatlier fiend. 
That roams the unthrifty furrows 

of my days. 
Yet walks the field of life ; and, 
where he strays. 
The husbandry of heaven for hell is 
gleaned. 

Lulls are there in man's life which 
are not peace. 
Tumults which are not triumphs. 
Do I take 
The pause of passion for the fiend's 
decease ? 
This frost of grief hath numbed 
the drowsing snake ; 
Which yet may wake, and sting me 
in the heat 
Of new emotions. What shall bar 

the door 
Against the old familiar, that of j 
yore 
Came witliout call, and sat within I 
my seat ? ■. 



When evening brings its dim grim 
hour again. 
And hell lets loose its dusky brood 
awhile, 
Shall 1 not find him in the darkness 
then ? 
The same subservient and yet in- 
solent smile ? 
The same indifferent ignominious 
face ? 
The same old sense of household 

horror, come 
Like a tame creature, back into its 
home ? 
Meeting me, haply, in my wonted 
place. 

With the loathed freedom of an un- 
loved mate. 
Or crouching on my pillow as of 
old ? 
Knowing I hate him, impotent in 
hate ! 
Therefore more subtle, strenuous, 
and bold. 



PALINGENESIS. 



297 



Thus ancient habit will usurp young 
will, 
And each new effort rivet the old 

thrall. 
No matter ! those who climb must 
count to fall, 
But each new fall will prove them 
climbing still, 

O wretched man ! the body of this 
death 
Which, groaning in the spirit, I 
yet bear [breath 

On to the end (so that I breathe the 
Of its corruption, even though 
breathing prayer). 
What shall take from me ? Must I 
drag forever 
The cold corpse of the life which I 

have killed 
But cannot bury ? Must my heart 
be filled 
Witl^ the dry dust of every dead en- 
deavor ? 

For often, at the mid of the long 
night, 
Some devil enters into the dead 
clay, 
And gives it life unnatural in my 
sight. [away. 

The dead man rises up ; and roams 
Back to the m«uldered mansions of 
the Past : 
And lights a lurid revel in the halls 
Of vacant years ; and lifts his 
voice, and calls. 
Till troops of phantoms gather round 
him fast. 

Frail gold-haired corpses, in whose 
eyes there lives 
A strange regret too wild to let 
them rest : 
Crowds of pale maidens, who were 
never wives 
And infants that all died upon the 
breast • [revelry 

That suckled them. And these make 
Mingled with wailing all the mid- 
night through. 



Till the sad day doth with stern 
light renew 
The toiling land, and the complain- 
ing sea. 

Full well I know that in this world 
of ours 
The dreadful Commonplace suc- 
ceeds all change ; 
We catch at times a gleam of -flying 
powers 
That pass in storm some windy 
mountain range : 
But, while we gaze, the cloud returns 
o'er all. 
And each, to guide him up the 

devious height. 
Must take, and bless, whatever 
earthly light 
From household hearths, or shep- 
herd fires, may fall. 

This wave, that groans and writhes 
upon the beach, 
To-morrow will submit itself to 
calm ; [of reach, 

That wind that rushes, moaning, out 
Will die anon beneath some breath- 
less palm ; 
Tliose tears, these sighs, these mo- 
tions of the soul. 
This inexpressible pining of the 

mind. 
The stern indifferent laws of life 
shall Mud, 
And. fix forever in their old control. 

Behold this half-tamed iiniverse of 
things ! 
That cannot break, nor wholly 
bear, its chain. 
Its heart by fits grows wild : it leaps, 
it springs ; 
Then the chain galls, and kennels 
it again. 
If man were formed with all his 
faculties 
For sorrow, I should sorrow for 
him less. [stress 

Considering a life so brief, the 
Of its short passion I might well 
despise : 



298 



THE WANDERER. 



But all man's faculties are for de- 
light ; 
But all man's life is compassed 
with what seems 
Framed for enjoyment : but from all 
that sight 
And sense reveal a magic murmur 
streams 
Int* man's heart, which says, or 
seems to say, 
" Be happy !" I . . and the heart 

of man replies, 
"Leave happiness to brutes: I 
would be wise : 
Give me, not peace, but science, 
glory, art." 

Therefore, age, sickness, and mor- 
tality [pain : 
Are but the lightest portion of his 
Therefore, shut out from joy, inces- 
santly 
Death finds him toiling at a task 
that's vain. have : 
I weep the want of all he pines to 
I weep the loss of all he leaves be- 
hind : — 
Contentment, and repose, and 
peace of mind. 
Pawned for the purchase of a little 
grave : 

I weep the hundred centuries of 
time ; 
I weep the millions that have 
squandered them 
In error, doubt, anxiety, and crime, 
Here, where the free birds sing 
from leaf and stem : 
I Aveep . . . but what are tears ? 
What I deplore 
I knew not, half a hundred years 

ago : 
And half a hundred years from 
hence, I know 
That what I weep for I shall know 
no more. 

The spirit of that wide and leafless 
wind 
That wanders o'er the unconi- 
panioued sea, 



Searching for what it never seems to 

find, 

Stirred in my hair, and moved my 

heart in me, 

To follow it, far over land and main: 

And everywhere over this earth's 

scarred face 
The footsteps of a God I seemed 
to trace ; 
But everywhere steps of a God in 
pain. 

If, haply, lie that made this heart of 
mine. 
Himself in sorrow walked the 
world erewhile, 
"What then am I, to marvel or repine 
That I go mourning ever in the 
smile 
Of universal nature, searching ever 
The phantom of a joy which here 

I miss ? 
My heart inhabits other worlds 
than this, 
Therefore my search is here a vain 
endeavor. 

Methought, ... (it was the mid- 
night of my soul, 
Dead midnight) that I stood on 
Calvary : 
I found the cross, but not the Christ. 
The whole 
Of heaven was dark : and I went 
bitterly 
Weeping, because I found him not. 
Methought, . . . 
(It was the twilight of the dawn 

and mist) 
I stood before the sepulchre of 
Christ : 
The sepulchre was vacant, void of 
aught 

Saving the cere-clothes of the grave, 

which were 
Upfolden straight and empty : 

bitterly 
Weeping I stood, because not even 

there 
I found him. Then a voice spake 

unto me, 



PALINGENESIS. 



299 



*' Whom seekest thou '? Why is thy 
heart dismayed ? 
Jesus of Nazareth, he is not here: 
Behold, the Lord is risen. Be of 
cheer : 
Approach, behold the place where 
he was laid." 

And while he spake, the sunrise 
smote the world. 
" Go forth, and tell thy brethren," 
spake the voice : 
" The Lord is risen." Suddenly mi- 
furled. 
The whole imclouded Orient did 
rejoice 
In glory, Wlierefore should I 
mourn that here 
My heart feels vacant of what 

most it needs ? 
Christ is risen ! . . . the cere- 
clotlies and the weeds 
That wrapped him lying in his seiDul- 
chre 

Of earth, he hath abandoned ; being 
gone 
Back into heaven, where we too 
must tinn 
Our gaze to find him. Pour, O risen 
Sun 
Of Eighteousness, the light for 
which I yearn 
Upon the dai'kness of this mortal 
hour, 
This track of night in which I 

walk forlorn : 
Behold the night is now far spent. 
The morn 
Breaks, breaking from afar through 
a night shower. 



EEQUIESCAT. 

I SOUGHT to build a deathless mon- 
ument 
To my dead love. Therein I 
meant to place 

All precious things, and rare : as 
Nature blent 



All single sweetnesses in one sweet 
face. 
I could not build it worthy her mute 
merit. 
Nor worthy her white brows and 
holy eyes. 
Nor worthy of her perfect and pure 
spirit, 
Nor of my own immortal mem- 
ories. 
But as some wrapt artificer of old. 
To 'enshrine the ashes of a virgin 
saint, 
Might scheme to work with ivory, 
and fine gold, 
And carven gems, and legended 
and quaint 
Seraphic heraldries ; searching far 
lands, 
Orient and Occident, for all things 
rare. 
To consecrate the toil of reverent 
hands. 
And make his labor, like her virtue, 
fair ; 
Knowing no beauty beautiful as she, 
And all his labor void, but to be- 
guile 
A sacred sorrow ; so I worked. Ah, 
see 
Here are the fragments of my 
shattered pile ! 
I keep them, and the flowers that 
sprang between 
Their broken workmanship — the 
flowers and weeds ! 
Sleep soft among the violets, O my 
Queen, — 
Lie calm among my ruined 
thoughts and deeds. 

EPILOGUE 

PART I. 

Change without term, and strife 
without result. 
Persons that pass, and shadows 
that remain. 

One strange, impenetrable, and oc- 
cult 



300 



THE WANDERER. 



Suggestion of a hope, that's hoped 

in vain, 
Behold the world man reigns in ! 

His delight 
Deceives ; his power fatigues ; 

his strength is brief ; 
Even his religion presupposes 

His morning is not certam of the 
night. 

1 -have beheld, without regmt, the 
trunk, 
Which propped three himdred 
summers on its boughs, 
Which housed, of old, the merry 
bird, and drunk 
The divine dews of air, and gave 
carouse 
To the free winds of heaven, lie 
overthrown 
Amidst the trees which its own 

fruitage bore. 
Its promise is fulfilled. It is no 
more. 
But it hath been. Its destiny is 
done. 

But the wild ash, that springs above 
the marsh ! 
Strong and superb it rises o'er the 
wild. 
Vain energy of being ! For the 
harsh 
And fetid ooze already liath de- 
filed 
The roots by whose sap it lives by. 
Heaven doth give 
No blessing to its boughs. Tlie 

humid wind 
Eots them. The vapors warp 
them. All declined. 
Its life hath ceased, ere it hath 
ceased to live. 

Child of the waste, and nursling of 

the pest ! 
A kindred fate hath watched and 

wept tliy own. 
Thine epitaph is written in my 

breast. 



Tears change. Day treads out 

day. For me alone 
No change is nursed within tlie 

brooding bud. 
Satiety I have not known, and 

yet, 

I wither in the void of life, and 
fret 
A futile time, with an unpeaceful 
blood. 

Tlie days are all too long, the nights 
too fair. 
And too much redness satiates the 
rose. 

blissful season ! blest and balmy 

air ! 
Waves ! moonlight ! silence ! 

years of lost repose ! 
Bowers and shades that echoed to 

the tread 
Of young Romance ! birds tliat, 

from woodland bars, 
Sang, serenading forth the timid 

stars ! 
Youth ! beauty ! passion I whither 

are ye fled ? 

1 wait, and long have waited, and 

yet wait 
The coming of the footsteps which 

ye told 
My heart to watch for. Yet the 

hour is late, 
And ye have left me. Did they 

lie, of old, 
Your thousand voices prophesying 

bliss ? 
That troubled all the current of a 

fate 
Which else might have been peace- 
ful ! I await 
The thing I have not found, yet 

would not miss. 

To face out childhood, and grow 
up to man. 
To make a noise, and question all 
one sees, 
The astral orbit of a world to span, 
And, after a few days, to take one's 
ease 



PALINGENESTS. 



301 



Under the graveyard grasses, — this, 
my friend, 
Appears to me a thing too strange 

but what 
I wish to know its meaning. I 
would not 
Depart before I have perceived the 
end. 



And I would know what, here below 
the sun, 
He is, and what is his place, that 
being which seems 
The end of all means, yet the means 
of none ; 
Who searches and -combines, 
aspires and dreams ; 
Seeking new things with ever the 
same hope. 
Seeking new hopes in ever the 

same thing ; 
A king without the powers of a 
king, 
A beggar with a kingdom in his 
scope ; 

Who only sees in what he hath at- 
tained 
The means whereby he may attain 
to more ; 
Who only finds in that which he 
hath gained 
The want of what he did not want 
before ; 
Whom weakness strengthens ; who 
is soothed by strife ; 
Who seeks new joys to prize the 

absent most ; 
Still from illusion to illusion tost. 
Himself the great illusion of his 
life ! 

Why is it, all deep emotion makes 
us sigh 
To quit this world ? What better 
thing than death 
Can follow after rapture ? " Let us 
die ! " 
This is the last wish on the lover's 
breath. 



If thou wouldst live, content thee. 
To enjoy 
Is to begin to perish. What is 

bliss, 
But transit to some other state 
from this ? 
That which we live for must our life 
destroy. 

Hast thou not ever longed for death ? 
If not, 
Not yet thy life's experience is at- 
tained. 
But if thy days be favored, if thy lot 
Be easy, if hope's summit thou 
hast gained, 
Die ! Death is the sole future left 
to thee. 
The knowledge of this life Ib. 

bound, for each, 
By his own powers. Death lies 
between our reach 
And all which, living, we have lived 
to be. 



Death is no evil, since it comes to 
all. 
For evil is the exception, not the 
law. 
What is it in the tempest that doth 
call 
Our spirits down its pathways ? 
or the awe 
Of that abyss and solitude beneath 
High momitain passes, which doth 

aye attract 
Such strange desire ? or in the cat- 
aract ? 
The sea ? It is the sentiment of 
death. 



If life no more than a mere seeming 
be, 
Away with the imposture ! If it 
tend 
To nothing, and to have lived seem- 
ingly 
Prove to be vain and futile in the 
end, 



302 



THE WANDERER. 



Then let us die, that we may really 
live, 
Or cease to feign to live. Let us 

possess 
Lasting delight, or lasting quiet- 
ness. 
What life desires, death, only death, 
can give. 

Where are the violets of vauisht 
years ? 
The sunsets Eachel watched by 
Laban's well ? 
Where is Fidele's face ? where Ju- 
liet's tears ? 
There comes no answer. There 
is none to tell 
What we go questioning, till our 
mouths are stopt 
By a clod of earth. Ask of the 

plangent sea, 
The wild wind wailing through the 
leafless tree, 
Ask of the meteor from the mid- 
night dropt ! 

Dome, Death, and bring the beauty 
back to all ! 
I do not seek thee, but I Avill not 
shun. 
And let thy coming be at even-fall, 
Thy pathway through the setting 
of the sun. 
And let us go together, I with thee. 
What time the lamps in Eden 

bowers are lit. 
And Melancholy, all alone, doth 
sit 
By the wide marge of some neglected 
sea. 

PAKT n. 

One hour of English twilight once 
again ! 
Lo ! in the rosy regions of the dew 
The confines of the world begin to 
wane. 
And Hesper doth his trembling 
lamp renew. 
Now is the inauguration of the 
night 1 



Nature's release to wearied earth 

and skies ! 
Sweet truce of Care I Labor's 

brief armistice ! 
Best, loveliest interlude of dark and 

light ! 

The rookery, babbling in the sunken 
wood ; 
The watchdog, barking from the 
distant farm. 
The dim light fading from the horned 
flood, 
That winds the woodland in its 
silver arm ; 
The massed and immemorial oaks, 
whose leaves 
Tre huslit in yonder healthy dells 

below ; 
The fragrance of the meadows that 
I know ; 
The bat, that now his wavering cir- 
cle weaves 

Around these antique towers, and 
casements deep 
That glimmer, through the ivy and 
the rose. 
To the faint moon, wliich doth be- 
gin to creep 
Out of the inmost heart o' the 
heavens' repose, 
To wander, all night long, without 
a sound, 
Above the fields my feet oft wan- 
dered once ; 
The larches tall and dark, which 
do ensconce 
The little churchyard, in whose hal- 
lowed ground 

Sleep half the simple friends my 

childhood knew : 
All, all the sounds and sights of 

this blest hour, 
Sinking within my heart of hearts, 

like dew, 
Eevive that so long parcht and 

drooping flower 
Of youth, the world's hot breath for 

many years 



PALINGENESIS. 



303 



Hath burned and withered ; till 
once more, once more. 

The revelation and the dream of 
yore 
Keturn to solace these sad eyes with 
tears ! 

Where now, alone, a solitaiy man, 
I pace once more the pathways of 
my home, 
Light-hearted, and together, once Ave 
ran, 
I, and the infant guide that used 
to roam 
With me, the meads and meadow- 
banks among. 
At dusk and dawn. How light 

those little feet 
Danced through the dancing grass 
and waving wheat. 
Where'er, far off, we heard the 
cuckoo's song ! 

I know now, little Ella, what the 
flowers 
Said to you then, to make your 
cheek so pale ; 
And why the blackbird in our laurel 
bowers 
Spake to you, only ; and the poor, 
pink snail 
Feared less your steps than those of 
the May-shower. 
It was not strange these creatures 

loved you so, 
And told you all. 'Twas not so 
long ago 
You were, yourself, a bird, or else a 
flower 

And, little Ella, you were pale, be- 
cause 
So soon you were to die. I know 
that now. 
And why there ever seemed a sort of 
gauze 
Over your deep blue eyes, and sad 
young brow. 
STou were loo good to grow up, 
Ella, you, 
And be a woman, such as I have 
loiowu ! 



And so upon your heart they put 
a stone, 
And left you, dear, amongst the 
flowers and dew. 

God's will is good. He knew what 
would be best. 
I will not weep thee, darling, any 
more ; 
I have not wept thee ; though my 
heart, opprest 
With many memories, for thy sake 
is sore. 
God's will is good, and great His 
wisdoni is. 
Thou wast a little star, and thou 

' didst shine 
Upon my cradle ; but thou wast 
not mine, 
Thou wast not mine, my darling ; 
thou art His. 

My morning star ! twin sister of my 
soul ! 
My little elfin friend from Fairy 
Land ! 
Whose memory is yet innocent of 
the whole 
Of that which makes me doubly 
need thy hand. 
Thy little guiding hand so soon with- 
drawn ! 
Here where I find so little like to 

thee. 
For thou wert as the breath of 
dawn to me, 
Starry, and pure, and brief as is the 
dawn. 

Thy knight was I, and thou my 
Fairy Queen. 
('Twas in the days of love and 
chivaliy !) 
And thou didst hide thee in a bower 
of green. 
But thou so well hast hidden thee, 
that I 
Have never found thee since. And 
thou didst set 
Many a task, and quest, and high 
emprise, 



T 



304 



THE WANDERER. 



Ere I should win my guerdon from 
thine eyes, 
So many, and so many, that not yet 

My tasks are ended, or my wander- 
ings o'er. 
But some day thou wilt send across 
the main 
A magic bark, and I shall quit this 
shore 
Of care, and find thee, in thy 
bower, again ; 
And thou wilt say, " My brother, 
hast thou found 
Our home, at last ? " . . . Whilst I, 

in answer, Sweet, 
(Shall heap my life's last booty at 
thy feet. 
And bare my breast with many a 
bleeding wound. 

The spoils of time ! the trophies of 
the world ! 
The keys of conquered towns, and 
captived kings ; 
And many a broken sword, and ban- 
ner furled ; 
The heads of giants, and swart 
Soldan's rings ; 
And many a maiden's scarf ; and 
many a wand 
Of baffled wizard ; many an amu- 
let ; 
And many a shield, with mine 
own heart's blood wet ; 
And jewels, dear, from many a dis- 
tant land ! 

God's will is good. He knew what 
would be best. 
I thouglit last year to pass away 
from life. 
I thought my toils were ended, and 
my quest 
Completed, and my part in this 
world's strife 
Accomplisht. And, behold ! about 
me now 
There rest the gloom, the glory, 
and the awe 



Of a new martyrdom, no dreams 
foresaw ; 
And the thorn-crown hath blossomed 
on my brow. 

A martyrdom, but with a martyr's 
Joy! 
A hope I never hoped for I and a 
sense 
That nothing henceforth ever can 
destroy : — 
Within my breast the serene con- 
fidence 
Of mercy in the misery of things ; 
Of meaning in the mysteiy of all ; 
Of blessing in whatever may be- 
full ; 
Of rest predestined to all wanderings. 

How sweet, with thee, my sister, to 
renew, 
In lands of light, the search for 
those bright birds 
Of plumage, so ethereal in its hue, 
And music sweeter than all mortal 
words. 
Which some good angel to our child- 
hood sent 
With messages from Paradisal 

flowers, 
So lately left, the scent of Eden 
bowers 
Yet lingered in our hair, where'er 
we went ! 

Now, they are all fled by, this many 
a year, 
AdoAvn the viewless valleys of the 
wind. 
And never more will cross this 
hemisphere. 
Those birds of passage ! Never 
shall I find, 
Dropt from the flight, you followed, 
dear, so far 
That you will never come again, 

I know, 
One plumelet on the paths by 
which I go, 
Missing thy light there, O my morn- 
ing star ! 



PALINGENESIS. 



305 



Soft, over all, doth ancient twilight 
cast 
Her dim gray robe, vague as fu- 
turity, 
And sad and hoary as the ghostly 
past, 
Till earth assumes invisibility. 
I hear the night-bird's note, where- 
with she starts 
The bee within the blossom from 

his dream. 
A light, like hope, from yonder 
pane doth beam, 
And now, like hope, it silently de- 
parts. 

Hush ! from the clock within yon 
dark church spire, 
Another hour broke, clanging, out 
of time. 
And passed me, throbbing like my 
my own desire, 
Into the seven-fold heavens. And 
now, the chime 
Over the vale, the woodland, and 
the river, 
More faint, more far, a quivering 

echo, strays 
From that small twelve-boured 
circle of our days, 
And spreads, and spreads, to the 
great round Forever. 

Pensive, the sombre ivied porch I 
pass. 
Through the dark hall, the sound 
of my own feet 
Piursues me, like the ghost of what I 
was, 
Into this silent chamber, where I 
meet 
From wall to wall the fathers of my 
race ; 
The pictures of the past from wall 

to wall ; 
Wandering o'er which, my wistful 
glances fall, 
To sink, at last, on little Ella's face. 

This is my home. And hither I re- 
turn, 
After much wandering in the ways 
of men, 

20 



Weary but not outworn. Here, with 
her urn 
Shall Memory come, and be my 
denizen. 
And blue-eyed Hope shall through 
the window look, 
And lean her fair child's face into 

the room. 
What time the hawthorn buds 
anew, and bloom 
The bright forget-me-nots beside the 
brook. 

Father of all which is, or yet may be, 
Ere to the pillow which my child- 
hood prest 
This night restores my troubled 
brows, by Thee 
May this, the last prayer I have 
learned, be blest ! 
Grant me to live that I may need 
from life 
No more than life hath given me, 

and to die 
That I may give to death no more 
than I 
Have long abandoned. And, if toil 
and strife 

Yet in the portion of my days must 
be. 
Firm be my faith, and quiet be my 
heart ! 
That so my work may with my will 
agree. 
And strength be mine to calmly 
fill my part 
In Nature's purpose, questioning not 
the end. 
For love is more than raiment or 

than food. 
Shall I not take the evil with the 
good ? 
Blessed to me be all which thou dost 
send ! 

Nor .blest the least, recalling what 

hath been, 
The knowledge of the evil I havo 

known 
Without me, and within mc. Since, 

to lean 



300 



THE WANDERER. 



Upon a strength far mightier than 
my own 
Such knowedge brought me. In 
whose strength I stand, 

Firmly upheld, even though, in 
ruin hurled. 

The fixed foundations of this roll- 
ing world 
Should topple at the waving of Thy 
hand. 



PAKT III. 

Hatl thou ! sole Muse that, in an 
age of toil, 
Of all the old Uranian sisterhood, 
Art left to light us o'er the furrowed 
soil 
Of this laborious star ! Muse, un- 
subdued 
By that strong hand which hath in 
ruin razed 
The temples of dread Jove ! Muse 

most divine, 
Albeit but ill by these pale lips of 
mine, 
In days degenerate, first named and 
praised ! 

Now the high airy kingdoms of the 
day 
Hyperion holds not. The disloyal 
seas 
Have In-oken from Poseidon's purple 
sway. 
Through Heaven's harmonious 
golden palaces 
No more the silver-sandalled mes- 
sengers 
Slide to sweet airs. Upon Olym- 
pus brow 
The gods' great citadel is vacant 
now. 
And not a lute to Love in Lesbos 
stirs. 

But thou wert born not on the 

Forke'd Hill, 
Nor fed from Hybla's hives by 

Attic bees, 
Nor on the honey Cretan oaks distil, 



Or once distilled, when gods had 
homes in trees, 
And young Apollo knew thee not. 
Yet thou 
With Ceres wast, when the pale 

mother trod 
The gloomy pathway to the nether 
god, 
And spake with that dim Power 
which dwells below 

The surface of whatever, where he 
wends. 
The circling sun illumineth. And 
thou 
Wast aye a friend to man. Of all 
his friends, 
Perchance the friend most needed : 
needed now 
Yet more than ever ; in a complex 
age 
Which changes while we gaze at 

it : from heaven 
Seeking a sign, and finding no 
sign given, 
And questioning Life's worn book 
at every page. 

Nor ever yet, was song, untaught by 
thee. 
Worthy to live immortally with 
man. 
Wherefore, divine Experience, bend 
on me 
Thy deep and searching eyes. 
Since life began. 
Meek at thy mighty knees, though 
oft reproved, 
I have sat, spelling out slow time 

with tears. 
Where down the riddling alphabet 
of years 
Thy guiding finger o'er the horn- 
book moved. 

And I have put together many 

names : 
Sorrow, and Joy, and Hope, and 

Memory, 
And Love, and Anger ; as an infailt 

frames 



PALINGENESIS, 



307 



The initials of a language wherein 
he 
In manhood must with men com- 
municate. 
And oft, the words were hard to 

understand, 
Harder to utter ; still the solemn 
hand 
Would pause, and point, and wait, 
and move, and wait ; 

Till words grew into language. Lan- 
guage grew 
To utterance. Utterance into mu- 
sic passed. 

I sang of all I learned, and all I 
knew. 
And, looking upward in thy face, 
at last, 

Beheld it flusht, as when a mother 
hears 
Her infant feebly singing his first 
hymn, 

And dreams she sees, albeit unseen 
of him. 

Some radiant listener lured from 
other spheres. 

Such songs have been my solace 
many a while 
And oft, when other solace I had 
none, 
From grief which lay heart-broken 
on a smile, 
And joy that glittered like a win- 
ter sun. 
And froze, and fevered : from the 
great man's scorn, 
The mean man's envy ; friend's 

unfriendliness ; 
Love's want of human kindness, 
and the stress 
Of nights that hoped for nothing 
from the morn. 

From these, and worse than these, 
did song unbar 
A refuge through the ivory gate of 
dreams, 
Wherein my spirit grew familiar 
With spirits that glide by spiritual 
streams ; 



Song hath, for me, unsealed the 
genii sleeping 
Under mid seas, and lured out of 

their lair 
Beings with wondering eyes, and 
wondrous hair. 
Tame to my feet at twilight softly 

creeping. 
And song hath been my cymbal in 
the hours 
Of triumph ; when behind me, far 
away. 
Lay Egypt, with its plagues ; and, 
by strange powers. 
Not mine, upheld, life's heaped 
ocean lay 
On either side a passage for my soul. 
A passage to the Land of Prom- 
ise ! trod 
By giants, where the chosen race 
of God 
Shall find, at last, its long predes- , 
tined goal. t 

The breath which stirred these songs 
a little while 
Has fleeted by ; and, with it, 
fleeted too 
The days I sought, thus singing, to 
beguile 
Of thoughts that spring like 
weeds, which will creep 
through 
The blank interstices of ruined 
fanes. 
Where Youth, adoring, sacri- 
ficed — its heart. 
To gods forever fallen. 

Now, we part, 
My songs and I. We part, and what 
remains ? 

Perchance an echo, and perchance 
no more. 
Harp of my heart, from thy brief 
music dwells 
In hearts, unknown, afar : as the 
wide shore 
Retains within its hundred hollow 
shells 
The voices of the spirits of the foam, 



3oS 



THE WANDERER, 



Which nmrmur in the language 
of the deeps, 

Though haply far away, to one 
who keeps 
Such ocean wealth to grace an in- 
land home. 

Within these cells of song, how frail 
soe'er, 
The vast and wandering tides of 
human life 
Have murmured once ; and left, in 
passing, there, 
Faint echoes of the tumult and the 
strife 
Of the great ocean of humanity. 
Fairies have danced within these 

hollow caves. 
And Memory mused ahove the 
moonlit waves, 
And Youth, the lover, here hath 
lingered by. 

I sung of life, as life would have me 
sing. 
Of falsehood, and of evil, and of 
wrong ; 
For many a false, and many an evil 
thing, 
I found in life ; and by my life my 
song 
Was shaped within me while I sung: 
I sung 
Of Good, for good is life's predes- 
tined end ; 
Of Sorrow, for I knew her as my 
friend ; 
Of Love, for by his hand my harp 
was strung. 

1 have not scrawled above the tomb 
of Youth 
Those lying epitaphs, which rep- 
resent 
All virtues, and all excellence, save 
truth. 
'Twere easy, thus, to have been 
eloquent, 
If I had held the fashion of the age 
Which loves to hear its sounding 
llattery 



Blown by all dusty winds from sky 
to sky. 
And finds its praises blotting every 
page. 

And yet, the Poel and the Age are 
one. 
And if the age be flawed, howe'er 
minute, 
Deej} through the poet's heart that 
rent doth run. 
And shakes and mars the music 
of his lute. 
It is not that his sympathy is less 
With all that lives and all that 

feels around him. 
But tliat so close a sympathy hath 
bound him 
To these, that he must utter their 
distress. 

We build the bridge, and swing the 
wondrous wire. 
Bind witli an iron hoop the rolling 
world ; 
Sport with the spirits of the ductile 
fire ; 
And leave our spells upon the va- 
por furled ; 
And cry — Behold the progress of the 
time ! 
Yet are we tending in an imkno wn 

land, 
"\Yliither, we neither ask nor un- 
derstand. 
Far fi'om the peace of our unvalued 



prime 



And Strength and Force, the fiends 
which minister 
To some new-risen Power beyond 
our span, 
On either hand, with hook and nail, 
confer 
To rivet the Promethean heart of 
man 
Under the ravening and relentless 
beak 
Of unappeasable Desire, which yet 
The very vitals of the age doth fret. 
The limbs are mighty, but the heart 
is weak. 



PALINGENESIS. 



■Writhe on, Prometheus ! or whate'er 
thou art, 
Thou giant sufferer, groaning for 
a race 
Thou canst not save, for all thy 
bleeding heart ! 
Thy wail my harp hath wakened ; 
and my place 
Shall be beside thee ; and my bless- 
ing be 
On all that makes me worthy yet 

to share 
Thy lonely martyrdom, and with 
thee wear 
That crown of anguish given to 
poets, and thee ! 

If to have wept, and wildly ; to have 
loved 
Till love grew torture ; to have 
grieved till grief 
Became a part of life ; if to have 
proved 
The want of all things ; if, to draw 
relief 
From poesy for passion, this avail, 
I lack no title to my crown. The 

sea 
Hath sent up nymphs for my so- 
ciety, 
The mountains have been moved to 
hear my wail. 

Nature and man were children long 
ago 
In glad simplicity of heart and 
speech. 
Now they are stranger's to each 
other's woe ; 
And each hath language different 
from each. 
Tlie simplest songs sound sweetest 
and most good. 
The simplest loves are the most 

loving ones. 
Happier were song's forefathers 
than their sons. 
And Homer sung as Byi'on never 
could. 

T;i!t Homer cannot come again : nor 



The quiet of the age in which he 
sung. 
This age is one of tumult and en- 
deavor, 
And by a fevered hand its harps 
are strung. 
And yet, I do not quarrel with the 
time ; 
Nor quarrel with the tumult of my 

heart, 
Wliich of the tumult of the age is 
part ; 
Because its very weakness is sublime. 

The passions are as winds on the 
wide sea 
Of human life ; which do impel 
the sails 
Of man's great enterprise, whate'er 
that be. 
The reckless helmsman, caught 
upon these gales. 
Under the roaring gulfs goes down 
aghast. 
The prudent pilot to the steadying 

breeze 
Sparely gives head ; and, over 
perilous seas, 
Drops anchor 'mid the Fortunate 
Isles, at last. 

We pray against the tempest and 
the strife, 
The storm, the whirlwind, and the 
troublous hour, 
Wliich vex the fretful element of life. 
Me rather save, O dread disposing 
Power, 
From those dead calms, that flat and 
hopeless lull, 
In which the dull sea rots around 

the bark. 
And nothing moves save the sure- 
creeping dark, 
That slowly settles o'er an idle hull. 

For in the storm, the tumult, and 

the stir 
That shakes the soul, man finds 

his power and place 
Among the elements. Deeps with 

deeps confer, 



310 



THE WANDERER. 



And Nature's secret settles in her 

face. 
I^et ocean to his inmost caves be 

stirred ; 
Let the Avild Hght be smitten from 

the cloud. 
The decks may reel, the masts be 

snapt and bowed, 
But God hath spoken out, and man 

hath heard ! 

Farewell, you lost inhabitants of my 
mind, 
You fair ephemerals of faded 
hours ! 
Farewell, you lands of exile, whence 
each wind 
Of memory steals with fragrance 
over flowers ! 
Farewell, Cordelia I Ella ! . . . But 
not so 
Farewell the memories of you 

which I have 
Till strangers shall be sitting on 
my grave 
And babbling of the dust M'hich lies 
below. 

Blesse'd the man whose life, how sad 
soe'er. 
Hath felt the presence, and yet 
keeps the trace 
Of one pure woman ! With religious 
care 
We close the doors, with reverent 
feet we pace 
The vacant chambers, where, of yore, 
a Queen 
One night hath rested. From my 

Past's pale walls 
Yet gleam the unf aded fair memo- 
rials 
Of her whose beauty there, awhile, 
hath been. 

She passed, into my youth, at its 

night-time, 
Wlien low the lamplight, and the 

music husht. 
She passed and passed away. Some 

broken rhyme 



Scrawled on the panel or the pane : 

the crusht 
And faded rose she dropped : the 

page she turned 
And finished not : the ribbon or 

the knot 
That fluttered from her .... 

Stranger, harm tliera not ! 
I keep these sacred relics undis- 

cerned. 

Men's truths are often lies, and avo- 
men's lies 
Often the setting of a truth most 
tender 
In an unconscious poesy. The child 
cries 
To clutch the star that lights its 
rosy splendor 
In airy Edens of the west afar. 
" Ah, folly ! "' sighs the father, o'er 

his book. 
"Millions of miles above thy fool- 
ish nook 
Of infantile desire, the Hesperus-star 

" Descends not, child, to twinkle on 
thy cot." 
Then readjusts his blind-\Vise spec- 
tacles. 
While tears to sobs are changing, 
were it not 
The mother, with those tender 
syllables 
Which even Dutch mothers can 
make musical loo. 
Murmurs, '* Sleep, sleep, my little 

one ! and I 
Will pluck thy star for thee, and 
by and by 
Lay it upon thy pillow bright with 
dew." 

And the child sleeps, and dreams of 
stars whose light 
Beams in his own bright eyes 
when he awakes. 
So sleep ! so dream ! If aught I read 
aright 
That star, poor babe, which o'er 
thy cradle shakes, 



PALINGENESIS. 



311 



Thy fate may fall, in after years, to 
be 
That other child that, like thee, 

loves the star, 
And, like thee, weeps to find it all 
so far, 
Feeling its force in his nativity : — 

That other infant, all as weak, as 
wild, 
As passionate, and as helpless, as 
thou art, 
Whom men will call a Poet (Poet, or 
child, 
The star is still so distant from the 
heart !) 
If so, heaven grant that thou mayst 
find at last, 
Since such there are. some woman, 

whose sweet smile, 
Pitying, may thy fond fancy yet 
beguile 
To dream the star, which thou hast 

sought, thou hast ! 
For men, if thou shouldst heed what 
they may say, 
Will break thy heart, or leave 
thee, like themselves, 
No heart for breaking. Wherefore 
I do pray 
My book may lie upon no learned 
shelves, 
But that in some deep summer eve, 
perchance, 
Some woman, melancholy-eyed, 
and pale, 



Whose heart, like mine, hath suf- 
fered, may this tale 
Read by the soft light of her own ro- 
mance. 

Go forch over the wide world. Song 
of mine ! 
As Noah's dove out of his boeom 
flew 
Over the desolate, vast, and wander- 
ing brine. 
Seek thou thy nest afar. Thy 
plaint renew 
From heart to heart, and on from 
land to land 
Fly boldly, till thou find that un- 
known friend 
Whose face, in dreams, above my 
own doth bend, 
Then tell that spirit what it will un- 
derstand. 

Why men can tell to strangers all 
the tale 
From friends reserved. And tell 
that spirit, my Song, 
Wherefore I have not faltered to un- 
veil 
The cryptic forms of error and of 
wrong. 
And say, I suffered more than I re- 
corded, 
That each man's life is all men's 

lesson. Say, 
And let the world believe thee, as 
it may. 
Thy tale is true, however weakly 
worded. 



312 



TANNHAUSER ; 



TANNHAUSER ; * 



THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 



A portion of this poem was written by another hand. 



This is the Land, the happy valleys 

these, 
Broad breadths of plain, blue-veined 

by many a stream. 
Umbrageous hills, sweet glades, and 

forests fair, 
O'er wliich our good liege, Landgrave 

Herman, rules. 
This is Thuringia : yonder, on the 

heights, 
Is Wartburg, seat of our dear lord's 

abode. 
Famous through Christendom for 

many a feat 
Of deftest knights, chief stars of 

chivalry. 
At tourney in its courts ; nor more 

renowned 
For deeds of Prowess than exploits 

of Art, 
Achieved when, vocal in its Muses' 

hall. 
The minstrel-knights their glorious 

jousts renew, 
And for the laurel wage harmonious 

war. 
On tliis side spreads the Chase in 

•wooded slopes 
And sweet acclivities ; and, all be- 
yond. 



The open flats lie fruitful to the sun 

Full many a league : till dark 
against the skj% 

Bounding the limits of our lord's do- 
main. 

The Hill of Horsel rears his horrid 
front. 

Woe to the man who wanders in the 
vast 

Of those unhallowed solitudes, if 
Sin, 

Quickening the lust of carnal appe- 
tite. 

Lurk secret in his heart : for all 
their caves 

Echo weird strains of magic, direful- 
sweet. 

That lap the wanton sense in bliss- 
ful ease ; 

While through the ear a reptile mu- 
sic creeps. 

And, blandly-busy, round about the 
soul 

Weaves its fell web of sounds. The 
unhappy wight 

Thus captive made in soft and silken 
bands 

Of tangled harmony, is led away — 

Awayadown the ever-darkening 
caves. 



* The reader is solicited to adopt the German pronunciation of TaunhAWSEB, by 
Bounding it as if it were written, in English, Tanahotser. 



OR, THE If A TTLE OF THE BARDS. 



z-^i 



Away from fairness and the face of 

God, 
Away into the mountain's mystic 

womb, 
To where, reclining on her impious 

couch 
All the fair length of her lascivious 

limbs, 
Languid in light from roseate tapers 

flung, 
Incensed with perfumes, tended on 

by fays. 
The lustful Queen, waiting damna- 
tion, holds 
Her bestial revels. The Queen of 

Beauty once, 
A goddess called and worshipped in 

the days 
When men their own infirmities 

adoiod. 
Deeming divine who in themselves 

sunnned vip 
The full-blown i>assions of human- 
ity. 
Large fame and lavish service had 

she then, 
Venus ycleped, of all the Olympian 

crew 
Least continent of Spirits an d most 

fair. 
So reaped she honor of unwistful 

men, 
Eoman, or Greek, or dwellers on 

the plains 
Of Egypt, or the isles to utmost Ind ; 
Till came the crack of that tremen- 
dous Doom 
That sent the false gods shivering 

from their seats. 
Shattered the superstitious dome 

that bleared 
Heaven's face to man, and on the 

lurid world 
Let in effulgence of untainted light. 
As when, laid bare beneath the del- 

ver's toil 
On some huge bulk of buried 

masonry 
In hoar Assyria, suddenly revealed 
A chamber, gay with sculpture and 

the pomp 



Of pictured tracery on its glowing 
walls, 

No sooner breathes the wholesome 
heavenly air 

Then fast its colored bravery lades, 
and fall 

Its ruined statues, crumbled from 
their crypts, 

And all its gauds grow dark at sight 
of day ; 

So darkened and to dusty ruin fell 

The fleeting glories of a Pagan faith, 

Bared to Truth's influences bland, 
and smit 

Blind by the splendors of the Beth- 
lehem Dawn. 

Then from their shattered temple in 
the minds 

Of men, and from their long familiar 
homes. 

Their altars, fanes, and shrines, the 
sumptuous seats 

Of their mendacious oracles, out- 
shuik 

The wantons of Olympus. Forth 
they fled. 

Forth from Dodona, Delos, and the 
depths 

Of wooded Ida ; from Atheiue forth, 

Cithseron, Paphos, Thebes, and all 
their groves 

Of oak or poplar, dismally to roam 

About the new baptize'd earth ; ex- 
iled. 

Bearing the curse, yet suffered for a 
space, 

By Heaven's clear sapience and in- 
scrutable ken, 

To range the wide world, and assay 
their powers 

To unrcgenerate redeemed man- 
kind : 

If haply they by shadows and by 
shows, 

Phantasmagoria, and illusions 
wrought 

Of sight or sound by sorcery, may 
draw 

Unwary men, or weak, into the nets 

Of Satan their great Captain. She 
renowned 



3'4 



TANNHAUSER ; 



"The fairest," fleeing from her 

Cyprian isle, 
Swept to the north\\'ards many a 

league, and lodged 
At lengiii on Horsel, into whose 

dark womb 
She crept confounded. Thither 

soon she drew 
Lewd Spirits to herself, and there 

abides. 
Holding her devilish orgies ; and has 

power 
With siren voices crafty to compel 
Into her wanton home unhappy 

men 
Whose souls to sin are prone. The 

pure at heart 
Nathless may roam about her pesti- 
lent hill 
Untainted, proof against perfidious 

sounds 
Within whose ears an -angel ever 

sings 
Good tidings of great joy. Nor 

even they, 
Wliose hearts are gross, and who 

inflamed with lust 
Enter, entrapped by sorceries, to her 

cave. 
Are damned beyond redemption. 

For a wdiile, 
Slaves of their bodies, in the sloughs 

of Sin, 
They roll contented, wallowing in 

the arms 
Of their libidinous goddess. But, 

erelong, 
Comes loathing of the sensual air 

they breathe, 
Loathing of light unhallowed, sick- 
ening sense 
Of surfeited enjoyment ; and their 

lips, 
bpummg the reeky pasture, yearn 

for draughts 
Of rock-rebounding rills, their eyes 

for sight 
Of Heaven, their limbs for lengths 

of dewy grass : 
What time sharp Conscience pricks 

them, and awake 



Starts the requickened soul with all 
her powers. 

And breaks, if so she will, the mur- 
derous spell. 

Calling on God. God to her rescue 
sends 

Voiced seraphims that lead the 
sinner forth 

From darkness imto day, from foul 
embrace 

Of that bloat Queen into the mother- 
lap 

Of earth, and the caressent airs of 
Heaven ; 

Where he, by strong presistency of 
prayer, 

By painful pilgrimage, by lengths of 
fast 

That tame the rebel flesh, by many 
a night 

Of vigil, days of deep repentant 
tears. 

May cleanse his soul of her adulter- 
ate stains, 

May from his sin-incrusted spirit 
shake 

The leprous scales, — and, purely at 
the feet 

Of his redemption falling, may arise 

Of Christ accepted. Whoso doubts 
the truth, 

Doubting how deep divine Compas- 
sion is. 

Lend to my tale a willing ear, and 
learn. 

Full twenty summers have fled o'er 

the land, 
A score of winters on our Land- 
grave's he9,d 
Have showered their snowy honors, 

since the days 
When in his court no nobler knight 

was known, 
And in his halls no happier bard was 

heard, 
Than bright Tannhiluser. Warrior, 

minstrel, he 
Throve for a while within the general 

eye, [tales, 

As some king-cedar, in Crusader 



OR, THE BA TTLE OF THE BARDS. 



315 



The stateliest growth of Lebanonian 

groves : 
For now I sing him in his matchless 

prime, 
Not, as in latter days, defaced and 

marred 
By secret sin, and like the wasted 

torch 
Found in the dank grass at the 

ghastly dawn, 
After a witches' revel. He was a 

man 
In whom prompt Nature, as in those 

soft climes 
Where life is indolently opulent. 
Blossomed unhid to graces barely 

won 
From tedious culture, where less 

kindly stars 
Cold influence keep ; and trothful 

men, who once 
Looked in his lordly, luminous eyes, 

and scanned 
His "sinewous frame, compact of 

pliant power. 
Aver he was the fairest-favored 

knight 
That ever, in the light of ladies' 

looks, 
Made gay these goodly halls. Oh ! 

deeper dole, [fair, 

That so august a Spirit, sphered so 
Should from the starry sessions of 

his peers 
Decline, to quench so bright a 

brilliancy 
In Hell's sick spume. Ay me, the 

deeper dole ! 
From yonder tower the wheeling 

lapwing loves 
Beyond all others, that o'ertops the 

pines, 
And from his one white, wistful 

window stares 
' Into the sullen heart 0' the land, — 

erewhile 
The wandering woodman oft, at 
I night-fall, heard 

I A sad, wild strain of solitary song 
Float o'er the forest. Whoso heard 
it, paused 



Compassionately, crossed himself, 

and sighed, 
" Alas ! poor Princess, to thy piteous 

moan 
Heaven send sweet peace I" Heaven 

heard, and now she lies 
Under the marble, 'mid the silent 

tombs. 
Calm with her kindred ; as her soul 

above 
Rests with the saints of God. 

The brother's child 
Of our good lord the Landgrave was 

this maid. 
And here with him abode ; for in the 

breach 
At Ascalon, her sire in Holy Land 
Had fallen, fighting for the Cross. 

These halls 
Sheltered her infancy, and here she 

grew 
Among the shaggy barons, like the 

pale, 
Mild-eyed, March- violet of the North, 

that blows 
Bleak under bergs of ice. Full fair 

she grew. 
And all men loved the rare Eliza- 
beth ; 
But she, of all men, loved one man 

the most, 
Tannhauser, minstrel, knight, the 

man in whom 
All mankind flowered. Fairer growth 

indeed, 
Of knighthood never blossomed to 

the eye ; 
But, furled beneath that florid sur- 
face, lurked 
A vice of nature, breeding death, 

not life ; 
Such as where some rich Koman, to 

delight 
Luxurious days with labyrinthian 

walks 
Of rose and lily, marble foxintains, 

forms 
Wanton of Greece or Nymph, and 

winding frieze 
With sculpture rough, hath decked 

the summer haunts 



3i6 



TANNHAUSER ; 



Of his voluptuous villa, — thtre, fes- 
tooned 

With flowers, among the Graces and 
the Gods, 

The lurking fever glides. 

A dangerous skill, 

Caught from the custom of those 
trouhadours 

That roam the Avantou South, too 
near the homes 

Of the lost gods, had crept in care- 
less use 

Among our northern bards ; to play 
the thief 

Upon the poets of a pagan time, 

And steal, to purfle their embroid- 
ered lays, 

Voluptuous trappings of lascivious 
lore. 

Hence had Tannhauser, from of old, 
indulged 

In song too lavish license to mislead 

The sense among those fair but 
phantom forms 

That haunt the unhallowed past : 
wherefrom One Shape 

Forth of the cloudy circle gi'adual 
grew 

Uistinct, in dissolute beauty. She of 
old. 

Who from the idle foam uprose, to 
reign [fiend, 

In fancies all as idle, — that fair 

Venus, whose temples are the veins 
in youth. 

Now more and ever more she mixed 

herself 
With all his moods, and whispered 

in his walks ; 
Or through the misty minster, when 

he kneeled 
Meek on the flint, athwart the in- 
cense-smoke 
She stole on sleeping sunbeams, 

sprinkled sounds 
Of cymbals through the silver psalms, 

and marred 
His adoration: most of all, whene'er 
He sought to fan those fires of holy 

love 



That, sleeping oftenest, sometimes 

leapt to flame. 
Kindled by kindred passion in the 

eyes 
Of sweet Elizabeth, round him rose 

and rolled 
That miserable magic ; and, at times, 
It drove him forth to wander in the 

waste 
And desert places, there where pray- 

erless man 
Is most within the power of prowling 

fiends. 
Time put his sickle in among the 

days. 
Outcropped the coming harvest; and 

there came 
An evening with the Princess, when 

they twain 
Together ranged the terrace that 

o'erlaps 
The great south garden. All her 

simple hair 
A single sunbeam from the sleepy 

west 
O'erfloated ; swam her soft blue eyes 

suffused 
With tender ruth, and her meek face 

was moved 
To one slow, serious smile, that stole 

to find 
Its resting-place on his. 

Then, while he looked 
On that pure loveliness, within him- 
self 
He faintly felt a mystery like pure 

love : 
For through the arid hollows of a 

heart 
Sered by delirious dreams, the dewy 

sense 
Of innocent worship stole. The one 

great word 
That long had hovered in the silent 

mind 
Now on the lip half settled ; for not 

yet 
Had love between them been a 

spoken sound 
For after speech to lean on ; only 

here 



OR, THE BA TTLE OF THE BARDS. 



317 



And there, where scattered pauses 

strewed their talk, 
Love seemed to o'erpoise the silence, 

lilve a star 
Seen through a tender trouble of 

light clouds. 
But, in that moment, some myste- 
rious touch, 
A thought — who knows ? — a memory 

— something caught 
Perchance from flying fancies, taking 

form 
Among the sunset clouds, or scented 

gusts 
Of evening through the gorgeous 

glooms, shrunk up 
His better angel, and at once awaked 
The carnal creature sleeping in the 

flesh. 
Then died within his heart that word 

of life 
Unspoken, which, if spoken, might 

have saved 
The dreadful doom impending. So 

they twain 
Parted, and nothing said : she to her 

tower. 
There with meek wonder to renew 

the calm 
And customary labor of the loom ; 
And he into the gradual-creeping 

dark 
Which now began to draw the rooks 

to roost 
Along the windless woods. 

His soul that eve 
Shook strangely if some flickering 

shadow stole 
Across the slopes where sunset, 

sleeping out 
The day's last dream, yet lingered 

low. Old songs 
Were sweet about "his brain, old 

fancies fair 
( >'erflowed with lurid life the lonely 

land : 
The twilight trooped with antic 

shapes, and swarmed 
Above him. and the deep mysterious 

woods " [doom. 

With mystic music drew him to his 



So rapt, with idle and with errant 
foot 

He wandered on to Horsel, and those 
glades 

Of melancholy fame, whose poison- 
ous glooms, 

Decked with tlie gleaming hemlock, 
darkly fringe 

The Mount of Venus. There, a 
drowsy sense 

Of languor seized him ; and he sat 
him down 

Among a litter of loose stones and 
blocks 

Of broken columns, overrun with 
weed, 

Eemnants of heathen work that 
sometime propped 

A pagan temple. 

Suddenly, the moon, 

Slant from the shoulder of the mon- 
strous hill, 

Swung o'er a sullen lake, and softly 
touched 

With light a shattered statue in the 
weed. 

He lifted up his eyes, and all at once 

Bright in her baleful beauty, he "be- 
held 

The goddess of his dreams. Be- 
holding whom, 

Lost to his love, forgetful of his faith. 

And fevered by the stimulated sense 

Of reprobate desire, the madman 
cried : 

" Descend, Dame Venus, on my soul 
descend ! 

Break up the marble sleep of those 
still brows 

Where beauty broods ! Down all my 
senses swim. 

As yonder moon to yonder love-lit 
lake 

Swims down in glory ! " 

Hell the horrid prayer 

Accorded with a curse. Scarce those 
wild words 

Were uttered, when like mist the 
marble moved, 

Flusht with false life. Deep in a 
sleepy cloud 



He seemed to sink beneath the 

sumptuous face 
Leaned o'er him, — all the whiteness, 

all the warmth, 
And all the luxury of languid limbs, 
Where violet vein-streaks, lost in 

limpid lengths 
Of snowy surface, wander faint and 

fine ; 
Wliilst cymballed music, stolen from 

underneath. 
Creeps through a throbbing light that 

grows and glows 
From glare to greater glare, until it 

gluts 
And gulfs him in. 

And from that hour, in court. 
And chase, and tilted tourney, many 

a month, 
From mass in holy church, and mirth 

in hall, 
From all the fair assemblage of his 

peers. 
And all the feudatory festivals, 
Men missed Tannhiiuser. 

At the first, as M'hen 
Froni some great oak his goodliest 

branch is lopped, 
The little noisy birds, that built 

about 
The foliage, gather in the gap with 

shrill 
And querulous curiosity ; even so, 
From all the twittering tongues that 

thronged the court 
Rose general hubbub of astonish- 
ment, 
And vext surmise about the .absent 

man : 
Why absent ? whither wandered ? on 

what quest 
Of errant prowess ? — for, as yet, 

none knew 
His miserable fall. But time wore 

on, 
The wonder wore away ; round ab- 
sence crept 
The weed of custom, and the absent 

one 
Became at last a memory, and no 

more. 



One heart within that memory lived 

aloof ; 
One face, remembering his, forgot to 

smile ; 
Our Landgrave's niece the old 

familiar ways 
Walked like a ghost with unfamiliar 

looks. 

Time put his sickle in among the 

days. 
The rose biu'iicd ouc ; red Autumn 

lit the wocds ; 
The last snows, melting, changed to 

snowy clouds ; 
And Spring once more with incan- 
tations came 
To wake the buried year. Then did 

our liege. 
Lord Landgrave Herman, — for he 

loved his niece. 
And lightly from her simple heart 

had won 
The secret of lost smiles, and why 

she drooped, 
A wilted flower, — thinking to dispel, 
If that might be, her mournfulness, 

let cry 
By heralds that, at coming Whitsun- 
tide, 
The minstrel-knights in Wartburg 

should convene 
To hold high combat in the craft of 

song, . 
And sing before the Princess for the 

prize. 

But, ere that time, it fell upon a day 

When our good lord went forth to 
hunt the hart, 

That he with certain of his court, 
'mid whom 

Was Wolfram, — once Tannhauser's 
friend, himself 

Among the minstrels held in high re- 
nown, — 

Came down the Wartburg valley, 
where they deemed 

To ho]<] the hart at siege, and 
t'onml him not : 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 



319 



But found, far down, at bottom of 

the glade, 
Beneath a broken cross, a lonely 

knight 
Who sat on a great stone, watching 

the clouds. 
And Wolfram, being a little in the 

van 
Of all his fellows, eager for the 

Ijunt, 
Hurriedly ran to question of the 

knight 
If he had viewed the hart. But when 

he came 
To parley with him, suddenly he 

gave 
A shout of great good cheer ; for, all 

at once, 
In that same knight he saw, and 

knew, though changed. 
Tannliauser, his old friend and 

fellow-bard. 

Now, Wolfram long had loved 

Elizabeth 
As one should love a star in heaven, 

who knows 
The distance of it, and the reachless- 

ness. 
But Avhen he knew Tannhauser in 

her heart 
(For loving eyes, in eyes beloved, are 

swift 
To search out secrets) not the less 

his own 
Clave unto both ; and, from that 

time, his love 
Lived like an orjjhan child in 

charity, 
Wliose loss came early, and is gently 

borne, 
Too deep for tears, too constant for 

complaint. 
And, therefore, in the absence of his 

friend 
His inmost heart was heavy, when 

he saw 
The shadow of that absence in the 

face ' 
He loved beyond all faces upon 

earth. 



So that when now he found that 

friend again 
Whom he had missed and mourned, 

right glad was he 
Both for his own and for the 

Princess' sake : 
And ran and fell upon Tannhauser's 

neck, 
And all for joy constrained him to 

his heart. 
Calling his fellows from the neigh- 
boring hills, — 
Who, ci'owding, came, great hearts 

and open arms 
To welcome back their peer. The 

Landgrave then,. 
When he perceived his well-beloved 

knight. 
Was passing glad, and would have 

questioned him 
Of his long absence. But the man 

himself 
Could answer nothing ; staring with 

blank eyes 
From face to face, then up into the 

blue 
Bland heavens above ; astonled, and 

like one 
Who, suddenly awaking out of sleep 
After sore sickness, knows his friends 

again. 
And would peruse their faces, but 

breaks off 
To list the frolic bleating of the 

lamb 
In far-off fields, and wonder at the 

world 
And all its strangeness. Then, while 

the glad knights 
Clung round him, wrung his hands, 

and dinned his ears 
With clattering que ry, our fair lord 

himself 
Unfolded how, upon the morrow 

morn. 
There should be holden festive in 

his halls 
High meeting of the minstrels of 

the land. 
To sing before the Princess for the 

prize : 



320 



TANNHAUSER ; 



Whereto he bade him with, ' ' O sir, 

be sure 
There lives .i young voice that shall 

tax your wit 
To justify this absence fi'om your 

friends. 
We trust, at least, that you have 

brought us back 
A score of giants' beards, or dragons' 

tails, 
To lay them at the feet of our fair 

niece. 
For think not, truant, that Eliza- 
beth 
Will hold you lightly quitted." 

At that name, 
Elizabeth, he started as a man 
That hears on foreign shores, from 

alien lips, 
Some name familiar to his father- 
land ; 
And all at once the man's heart inly 

yearns 
For brooks that bubble, and for 

woods that wave 
Before his father's door, while he 

forgets 
The forms about him. So, Tami- 

hiiuser mused 
A little space, then faltered : " O my 

liege. 
Fares my good lady well ? — I pray 

my lord 
That I may draw me hence a little 

while. 
For all my mind is troubled : and, 

indeed, 
I know not if my harp have lost his 

skill, 
But, skilled, or skilless, it shall find 

some tone 
To render thanks to-morrow to my 

lord ; 
To whose behests a bondsman, in so 

far 
As my poor service holds, I will 

assay 
To sing before the Princess for the 

prize." 
Then, on the morrow morn, from far 

and near I 



Flowed in the feudatory lords. The 

hills 
Broke out ablaze with banners, and 

rung loud 
With tingling trumpet notes, and 

neighing steeds. 
For all the land, elate with lusty 

life, 
Buzzed like a beehive in the sun ; 

and all 
The castle swarmed from bridge to 

barbican 
With mantle and with mail, whilst 

minster bells 
Bang hoarse their Jiappy chimes, till 

the high noon 
Clanged from the towers. Then, 

o'er the platform stoled 
And canopied in crimson, lightly 

blew 
The sceptred heralds on the silvei 

trump 
Intense sonorous music, sounding 

in 
The knights to hall. Shrill clinked 

the corridors 
Through all the courts with clashing 

heels, or moved 
With silken mm-murs, and elastic 

sounds 
Of lady laughters light ; as in they 

flowed 
Lord, Liegeman, Peer, and Prince, 

and Paladin, 
And dame aiid damsel, clad in dimp- 
ling silk 
And gleaming pearl ; who, while 

the groaning roofs 
Re-echoed royal music, swept adown 
The spacious hall, with due obei- 
sance made 
To the high dais, and on glittering 

seats 
Dropped one by one, like flocks of 

burnished birds 
That settle down with sunset-painted 

plumes 
On gorgeous woods. Again from 

the outer wall 
The intermitted trumpet blared ; and 

each 



OR, THE BA TTLE OF THE BARDS. 



321 



Pert page, a-tiptoe, from the benches 
leaned 

To see the minstrel-knights, gold- 
filleted, 

That entered now the hall : Sir 
Mandeville, 

The Swan of Eisnach ; Wilfrid of 
the Hills ; 

Wolfram, surnamed of Willow- 
brook ; and next 

Tannhauser, christened of the Gold- 
en Harp ; 

With Walter of the Heron-chase ; 
and Max, 

The seer ; Sir Paidolph, of the 
Piavencrest ; 

And Franz, the falconer. They en- 
tered, each 

In order, followed by a blooming boy 

That bore his harp, and, pacing for- 
ward, bowed 

Before the Landgrave and Elizabeth. 

Pale sat the Princess in her chair of 
state, [lied 

Perusing with fixed eyes, that all be- 

Her throbbing heart, the carven 
architrave. 

Whereon the intricate much-vexed 
design 

Of leaf and stem disintertwined itself 

With infinite laboriousness, at last 

Escaping in a flight of angel forms ; 

As though the carver's thought had 
been to show 

The weai-y struggle of the soul to free 

Her flight from earth's bewilder- 
ment, and all 

That frets her in the flesh. But 
when, erewhile, 

Tho minstrels entered, and Tann- 
hauser bowed 

Before the dais, the Landgrave, at 
her side. 

Saw, as he mused what theme to 
give for song, 

The pallid forehead of Elizabeth 

Flush to the fair roots of her golden 
hair. 

And thought within himself : " Our 
knight delays 

21 



To own a love that anns so near our 

throne ; 
Hence, haply, this late absence from 

our court. 
And those bewildei-ed moods which 

I have marked : 
But since love lightly catches, where 

it can. 
At any means to make itself ap- 
proved. 
And since the singer may to song 

confide 
What the man dares not trust to 

simple speech, 
I, therefore, so to ease two hearts at 

once, 
And signify our favor unto both, 
Will to our well-belove'd minstrels 

• give 
N"o theme less sweet than Love : 

for, surely, he 
That loves the best, will sing the 

best, and bear 
The prize from all." Therewith the 

Landgrave rose. 
And all the murmuring Hall was 

hushed to hear. 

" O well-beloved minstrels, in my 

mind 
I do embrace you all, and heartily 
Bid you a lavish welcome to these 

halls. 
Oft have you flooded this fair space 

with song. 
Waked these voiced walls, and vocal 

made yon roof. 
As waves of surging music lapped 

against 
Its resonant rafters. Often have 

your strains 
Ennobled souls of true nobility, 
Eapt by your perfect pleadings in the 

cause 
Of all things pure unto a purer senso 
Of their exceeding loveliness. No 

power 
Is subtler o'er the spirit of man than 

Song — 
Sweet echo of great thoughts, that, 

in the mind 



322 



TANNHAUSER ; 



Of him vho hears congenial echoes 

wa'ing, 
Remultiplies the praise of what is 

good. 
Song clict'i-s the emulous spirit to 

the top 
Of Virtue's rugged steep, from 

wlieiico, all iieights 
Of human wortli attained, the mor- 
tal may 
Conjecture of God's unattainahle, 
Whicli is Perfection. — Faith, witli 

lier sisters twain 
Of Hope and C'iiarity, ye oft have 

sung. 
And loyal Truth have lauded, and 

have wreathed 
A coronal of nuisic round the hrows 
Of stainless Cliaslily ; nor less have 

praised 
Uigh-minded Valor, in whose right- 
eous hand 
Burns the great sword of flaming 

Fortitude, 
And have stirred up to deeds of high 

emprize 
Our noble knights (yourselves among 

the Holiest) 
"Whether on (Jernian soil for me, 

their prince, 
Fighting, or in the Land of Christ 

for God. 
Sing ye to-day aiu)thert]ieme ; to-day 
"Within our glad society wo see. 
To fellowsliip of loving friends re- 

stoivd, 
A long-missed face ; and hungerly 

oui' ears 
"Wait the melodious murmurs of a 

harj) 
That tvont to feed them daintily. 

AVhat drew 
Our siiiiier forth, and led the fairest 

light 
Of all our galaxy to swerve astray 
From his fixed orbit, and what now 

re-splifi-cs. 
After dctlcei ion long, oiu* errant orb. 
implii's a secret tliat the suljtlepower 
Of Song, percliance, may solve. Be 

then your theme 



As universal as tlie heart of man, 
Giving you scope to touch its deepest 

depths. 
Its highest heights, and i-everently 

to explore 
Its inyslei-y of mysteries. Sing of 

Love : 
Tell us, ye noble poets, from what 

source 
Springs the prime passion ; to what 

goal it tends ! 
Sing it liow brave, how beautiful, 

how bright, 
In essence how ethereal, in effect 
Ilow palpable, how human yet di- 
vine. 
Up ! up ! loved singers, smite into 

the chords. 
The lists are opened, set your lays in 

i-est. 
And who of Love best chants the 

perfect pi'aise, 
II im shall Elizabeth as conqueror 

hail 
And round his royal temples bind 

the bays." 

lie said, and sat. And from the 

middle-hall 
Four pages, bearers of the blazoned 

urn 
That held the name-scrolls of the 

listed bards. 
Moved to Elizabeth. Daintily her 

hand 
Dipped in the boAvl, and one drawn 

scroll delivered 
Back to the pages, who, perusing, 

ciied : 
"Sir "Wolfram of the "Willow-brook, 

—begin." 



Up rose the gentle singer— he whoso 

lays. 
Melodious-melancholy, through the 

Land 
Live to tills day — and, fair obeisanco 

made, 
Assumed bis harp and stood iu act 

to sing. 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 



323 



Awliile, his dreamy fingers o'er the 

chords 
Wandered at will, and to the roof 

was turned 
His mediiative face ; till, suddenly, 
A soft light from his spiritual eyes 
Broke, and his canticle he thus be- 
gan :— 

" Love among the saints of God, 
Love within the hearts of men. 
Love in every kindly sod 
That breeds a violet in the glen ; 
Love in heaven, and Love on earth, 
Love in all the amorous air ; 
Whence comes Love ? ah ! tell 

me where 
Had such a gracious Presence 

birth ? 
Lift thy thoughts to Him, all- 
knowing, 
In the hallowed courts above ; 
From His throne, forever flowing, 
Springs the fountain of all Love : 
Down to earth the stream de- 
scending 
Meets the hills, and murmurs then, 
In a myriad channels wending. 
Through the happy haunts of men. 
Blesse'd ye, earth's sons and daugh- 
ters, 
Love among you flowing free ; 
Guard, oh! guard ils sacred waters, 
Tend on them religiously : 
Let them through your hearts 

steal sweetly, 
With the Spirit, wise and bland. 
Minister unto them meetly, 
Touch them not with carnal hand. 

" Maiden, fashioned so divinely, 
Whom I worship from afar, 
Smile thou on my soul benignly 
Sweet, my solitary star : 
Gentle harbinger of gladness. 
Still be with mo on the way ; 
Only soother of my sadness. 
Always near, though far away : 
Always near, since first upon me 
Fell tliy brightness from above. 
And my troubled heart wilhin me 



Felt the sudden flow of Love ; 
At thy sight that gushing river 
Paused, and fell to perfect rest, 
And the pool of Love forever 
Took thy image to its breast. 

" Let me keep my passion purely, 
Guard its waters free from blame. 
Hallow Love, as knowing surely 
It returneth whence it came ; 
From all channels, good or evil. 
Love, to ils pure source enticed, 
Finds its own immortal level 
In the charity of Christ. 
"Ye who hear, behold the river. 
Whence it cometh, whither goes ; 
Glory be to God, the Giver, 
From whose grace the fountain 

flows, 
Flows and spreads through all cre- 
ation. 
Counter-charm of every curse, 
Love, the waters of Salvation, 
Flowing through the universe?" 

And still the rapt bard-, though his 
voice had ceased, 

And all the Hall had murmured into 
praise, 

Pursued his plaintive theme among 
the chords. 

Blending with instinct fine the intri- 
cate throng 

Of thoughts that flowed beneath his 
touch to find 

Harmonious resolution. As he 
closed, 

Tannhauser rising, fretted with de- 
lay > 

Sent flying fingers o'er the strings, 
and sang : — 

" Love be my theme ! Sing hef 

awake. 
My harp, for she hath tamelj 

slttpt 
In Wolfram's song, a stagnant 

lake 
O'er which a shivering star hath 

crept. 



324 



TANNHA USER ; 



" Awake, dull waters, from your 

sleep, 
Rise, Love, from thy delicious 

well, 
A fouiuain ! — yea, but flowing 

deep 
With nectar and with hydromel ; 

"With gurgling murmurs sweet, 

that teacli 
My soul a sleep-distracting dream, 
Till on the marge I lie, and reach 
My longing lips towards the 

stream ; 

" Whose waves leap upwards to 

the brinlv 
With drowning kisses to Invite 
And drag me, willing, down to 

drink 
Delirious draughts of rare Delight ; 

"Who careless drink, as knowing 

well 
The happy pastime shall not tire, 
For Love is inexhaustible. 
And a!l-unfailing my Desire. 



"Love's fountain-marge is fairly 

spread 
With every incense-flower that 

blows, 
With flossy sedge, and moss that 

grows 
For fervid limbs a dewy bed ; 

"And fays and fairies flit and 

wend 
To keep the sweet stream flowing 

free, 
And on Love's languid votary 
The little elves delighted tend ; 

"And bring him honey-dews to 

sip, 
Rare balms to cool him after play, 
Or with sweet unguents smooth 

away 
The kjss-crease on his ruffled lip ; 



"And lilywhite his limbs they 

lave, 
And roses in his cheeks renew, 
Tliat he, refreshed, return to glue 
His lips to Love's caressent wave ; 

"And feel, in that immortal kiss, 
His mortal instincts die the death, 
And human fancy fade beneath 
The taste of unimagined bliss ! 



" Thus, gentle audience, since your 

ear 
Best loves a metaphoric lay, 
Of mighty Love I warble here 
In figures, such as Fancy may : 

" Now know ye how of Love I 
think 

As of a fountain, failing never, 

On whose soft marge I lie, and 
drink 

Delicious draughts of Joy for- 
ever." 

Abrupt he ceased, and sat. And for 

a space. 
No longer than the subtle lightning 

rests 
Upon a sultry cloud at eventide. 
The Princess smiled, and on her 

parted lips 
Hung inarticulate applause ; but she 
Sudden was 'ware that all the liall 

was mute 
With blank disapjorobation ; and her 

smile 
Died, and vague fear was quickened 

in her heart 
As Walter of the Heron-chase be- 
gan :— 

" O fountain ever fair and bright. 
He hath beheld thee, source of 

Love, 
Who sung thee springing from 

above. 
Celestial from the founts of Light; 



OR, THE BA TTLE OF THE B-ARDS. 



3^5 



" But be who from tliy waters rare 
Hatli thought to drain a gross de- 

hght, 
Blind in his spiritual sight, 
Hatli ne'er beheld thee, fountain 

fair ! 

" Hath never seen the silver glow 
Of thy glad waves, crystalline 

clear, 
Hatli never heard within his ear 
The music of thy murmm'ous flow. 

" Tlie essence of all Good thou art, 
Thy waters are immortal Ruth, 
Thy murmurs are the voice of 

Truth, 
And music in the human heart : 

" Thou yieldest Faith that soars 

on high. 
And Sympathy that dwells on 

earth ; 
The tender trust in human worth. 
The hope that lives beyond the 

sky. 

" Oh ! waters of the living Word, 
Oh ! fair vouchsafed us from 

above, 
Oh ! fountain of immortal Love, 
What song of thee erewhile I 

heard ! 

"Learn, sacrilegious bard, from 

me 
How all ignoble was thy strain, 
That sought with trivial song to 

stain 
Tlie fountain of Love's purity ; 

" That fountain thou hast never 
found. 

And shouldst thou come with lips 
of fire 

To slake the thirst of brute De- 
sire, 

'Twould slirink and shrivel to the 
ground : 

" Who seeks in Love's pure stream 

to lave 
His gross heart, finds damnation 

near ; 



Wl-.o laves in Love his spirit clear 
Shall win Salvation from the 
wave." 

And now again, as when the plain- 
tive lay 

Of Wolfram warbled to harmonious 
close. 

The crowd grew glad with plaudits ; 
and again 

Taunhauser, ruffled, rose his height, 
and smote 

Eude in the chords his prelude of 
reply :— 

"What Love is this that melts 

with Ruth, 
Whose murmm'S are the voice of 

Truth ? 
Ye daze'i singers, cease to dream, 
And learn of me yoiu* human 

theme : 
Of that great Passion at whose 

feet 
The vassal-world lies low, 
Of Love the mighty, Love the 

sweet, 
I sing, who reigns below ; 
Who makes men fierce, tame, 

wild, or kind. 
Sovran of every mood. 
Who rules the heart, and rules the 

mind. 
And courses through the blood : 
Slave of that levish Power I sing, 
Dispenser of all good. 
Whose pleasure-fountain is the 

spring 
Of sole beatitude. 

" Sing ye of Love ye ne'er pos- 
sessed 

In wretched tropes — a vain em- 
ployment ! 

I sing the passion in my breast, 

And know Love only in Enjoy- 
ment." 

To whom, while all the rustling hall 
was moved 

With stormy indignation, stem up- 
rose. 



326 



TANNHAUSER; 



Sharp in retort, Sir Wilfrid of the 
Hills : 

" Up, minstrels ! rally to the cry 

Of outraged Love and Loyalty ; 

Drive on this slanderer, all the 
throng, 

And slay him in a storm of song. 

O lecher ! shall I sing to thee 

Of Love's untainted purity. 

Of simple Faith, and tender Ruth, 

Of Chastity and loyal Ti'uth ? 

As well sing Day's resplendent 
birth 

To the blind mole that delves the 
earth. 

As seek from gross hearts, slough- 
ed in sin, 

Approval of pure Love to win ! 

Kather from thee I'll wring ap- 
plause 

For Love, the Avenger of his 
cause ; 

Great Love, the chivalrous and 
strong. 

To whose wide grasp all arms be- 
long. 

The lance, the battle-axe, and 
thong, — 

And eke the mastery in song. 

** Love in my heart in all the pride 
Of kinghood sits, and at his side. 
To do the bidding of his lord, 
Martial Valor holds the sword ; 
He strikes for honor, in the name 
Of Virtue and fair woman's fame, 
And bids me shed my dearest 

blood 
To avenge aspersed maidenhood : 
Who soils her with licentious lie. 
Him will I hew both hip and 

thigh. 
Or in her cause will dearly die. 
But thou, who in thy flashy song 
Hast sought to do all Honor 

wrong, 
Pass on, — I will not stoop my 

crest 
To omite thee, nor lay lance in 

iu rest. 



Thy brawling words, of riot born, 
Are worthy only of my scorn ; 
Thus at thy ears this song I fling. 
Which in thy heart may plant its 

sting, 
If ruined Conscience yet may wring 
Itemorse from such a guilty thing." 

Scarce from his lips had parted the 

last word 
When, through the rapturous praise 

that rang around. 
Fierce from his seat, uprising, red 

with rage. 
With scornful lip, and contumelious 

eye, 
Tannhaiiser clanged among the 

chords, and sang : 

" Floutest thou me, thou grisly 

Bard ? 
Beware, lest I the just reward 
On thy puffed insolence bestow. 
And cleave thee with my falchion's 

blow, — 
When I in song have laid thee low. 
I serve a Mistress mightier far 
Than tinkling rill, or twinkling 

star, 
And, as in my great Passion's glow 
Thy passion-dream Mill melt like 

snow, 
So I, Love's champion, at her call, 
Will make thee shrink iu field or 

hall, 
And roll before me like a ball. 

" Thou pauper-minded pedant 

dim, 
Thou starveling-soul, lean heart 

and grim, 
Wouldst thou of Love the praises 

hymn ? 
Then let the gaunt hyena howl 
In praise of Pity ; let the owl 
Whoop the high glorios of the 

noon, 
And the hoarso chough bccroak the 

moon ! 
What canst thou prate of Love ? I 

trow 



OR, THE BA TTLt OF THE BARDS. 



327 



She never graced thy open brow, 
Nor lluslied thy cheek, nor blos- 
somed fair 
Upon thy parted lips ; nor e'er 
Bade uiipent passion wildly start 
Throngh the forced portals of thy 

heart 
To streain in triuniph from thine 

eye, 
Or else delicions death to die 
On other lips, in sigh on sigh. 

' Of Love, dispenser of all bliss, 
Of Love, that crowns uie with a 

kiss, 
I here proclaim me champion- 
knight ; 
And ill her cansc will dearly fight 
With sword or song, in hall or 

plain, 
And make tlie welkin ring again 
With Tuy fierce blows, or fervent 

strain. 
But for such Love as thou canst 

feel. 
Thou wisely hast abjured the steel. 
Averse to lay thy hand on hilt, 
Or in her honor ride a tilt : 
Tame Love full tamely may'st 

thou jilt. 
And keep bone whole, and blood 

unspilt." 

Out flushed Sir Wilfrid's weapon, 

and out leapt 
From evei'y angry eye a thousand 

darts 
Of unsheathed indignation, and a 

shout 
Went uji among the rafters, and the 

Hall 
Swayed to and fro with tumult ; till 

the voice 
Of our liege lord roared "Peace !" 

and, midst the clang 
Of these who parted the incensc'd 

hards, 
Sounded the harp of Wolfram. 

Calm he stood. 
He only calm of all the brawling 

crowd, 



Which yet. as is its wont, contagion 

caught 
From neighboring nobleness, and a 

stillness fell 
On all, and in the stillness soft he 

sang : 

"O, from your sacred seats look 

down. 
Angels and ministers of good ; 
With sanctity our spirits crown. 
And crush the vices of the blood ! 

"Open our hearts and set them 

free, 
That heavenly light may enter in; 
And from this fair society 
Obliterate the taint of siu. 

" Thee, holy Love, I bid arise 
Propitious to my votive lay ; 
Shine thou upon our darkened 

eyes. 
And lead us on the perfect way ; 

" As, in the likeness of a Star, 
Thou once arosest, guidance meet, 
And led'st tlie sages from afar 
To sit at holy Jesu's feet : 

" So guide us, safe from Satans 
snares. 

Shine out, sweet Star, around, 
above, 

Till we have scaled the mighty 
stairs. 

And reached thy mansions, Heav- 
enly Love ! " 

Then, while great shouts went up of 
" Give the prize 

To Wolfram," leapt Tannhauser 
from Ills seat. 

Fierce passion flauiing from his lus- 
trous oi'bs. 

And, as a sinner, desperate to add 

Depth to damnation by one latest 
crime. 

Dies boastful of his blasphemies — 
even so, 

Tannhiiuser, conscious of the last 
disgrace 



Incurred by such song in such com- 
pany, 

Intent to vaunt the vastness of his 
sin, 

Thus, as in ecstasy, the song re- 
newed : 

"Goddess of Beauty, theo I hymn. 
And ever worship at tliy shrine ; 
Tliou, who on mortal senses dim 
Descending, makcst man divine. 

" Wlio hatli embraced thee on tliy 

til rone, 
And pastured on tliy royal kiss. 
He, happy, knows, and knows 

alone. 
Love's full beatitude of bliss. 

" Grim bards, of Love who nothing 

know. 
Now cease the unequal strife be 

tween us ; 
Dare as I dared ; to Hiirsel go. 
And taste Love on the lips of 

Venus." 

Uprose on every side and rustled 
down 

The affrighted dames ; and, like the 
shuddering crowd 

Of party-colored'leaves that flits be- 
fore 

The gust of mid October, all at once 

A hundred jewelled shoulders, hud- 
dling, swept 

The hall, and slanted to the doors, 
and fled 

Bcfoi-e the storm, which now from 
shaggy brows 

'Gan dart indignant lightnings. One 
alone 

Of all that awe-struck womanhood 
i"emained. 

The Princess. She, a purple hare- 
bell frai', 

That, SM'athed with M'hirlwind, to 
the bleak rock clings 

When half a forest falls "before the 
blast, 

Rootod in utter wretchedness, and 
robed 



In mockery of splendid state, still 
sat ; 

Still watched the waste that widened 
in her life ; 

And looked as one that in a night- 
mare hangs 

Upon an edge of horror, while from 
beneath 

The creeping billow of calamity 

Sprays all his hair with cold ; but 
hand or foot 

He may not move, because the form- 
less Fear 

Gapes vast behind him. Grief within 
the void 

Of her stark eyes stood tearless : ter- 
I'or blanched 

Her countenance ; and, over clondy 
brows. 

The shaken diamond made a rest- 
less light, 

And trembled as the trembling star 
that hangs 

O'er Cassiopeia i' the windy north. 

But now, from farthest end to end 

of all 
The sullen movement swarming 

luiderneath, 
Uprolled deep hollow groans of 

growing wrath. 
And, where erewhile in rainbow 

crescent ranged 
The bright-eyed beauties of the court, 

fast thronged 
Faces inflamed with wrath, that rose 

and fell 
Tumultuously gathering from be- 
tween 
Sharp-slanting lanes of steel. For 

every sword 
Flashed bare upon a sudden ; and 

over these. 
Through the wide bursten doors the 

sinking sun 
Streamed lurid, lighting up that 

steely sea ; 
Which, si)otted white with foamy 

plumes, and ridged 
With g'littering iron, clashed together 

and closed 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 



3^9 



About Tannhauser. Careless of the 
wrath 

Eoused by his own rash song, the 
singer stood ; [fooled 

Eapt in renienibrance, or by fancy 

A visionary Venus to pursue, 

With eyes that roamed in rajjture 
the blank air. 

Until the sharp light of a hundred 
swords 

Smote on the fatal trance, and scat- 
tered all 

Its fervid fascination. Swift from 
sheath 

Then leapt the glaive and glittered 
in his hand. 

And warily, with eye upon the watch, 

Receding to the mighty main sup- 
port 

That, from the centre, propped the 
ponderous roof, 

There, based against the pillar, front- 
ing full 

His sudden foes, he rested resolute, 

Awaiting assault. 

But, hollow as a bell, 

That tolls for tempest from a storm- 
clad tower, 

Eang through the jangling shock of 
arms and men 

The loud voice of the Landgrave. 
Wide he swept 

The solemn sceptre, crying " Peace !" 
then said : 

" Ye Lieges of Thuringia ! whose 
just scorn, 

Li judgment sitting on your right- 
eous brows. 

Would seem to have forecast the 
dubious doom 

Awaiting our decision ; ye have 
heard, 

Not wrung by torture from your 
reluctant lips, 

Nor yet breathed forth with peni- 
tential pain 

In prayer for pardon, nay, but rather 
fledged 

And barbed with boasted insolence, 
such a crime 



Confest, as turns to burning coals of 

wrath 
The dewy eyes of Pity, nor to Hope 
One refuge spares, save such as rests 

perchance 
Within the bounteous bosom of the 

Church ; 
Who, caring for the frailty of her 

flock. 
Holds mercy measureless as heaven 

is high. 
Shuddering, ourselves have listened 

to wiiat breaks 
All bonds that bound to this un- 
happy man 
The covenanted courtesies of knights, 
The loyalties of lives by faith knit 

fast 
In spiritual communion. What be- 
hooves. 
After deliberation, to award 
In sentence, I to your high council 

leave, 
Undoubting. What may mitigate 

in aught 
The weight of this acknowledged 

infamy 
Weigh with due balance. What to 

justice stern 
Mild-minded mercy yet may reconcile 
Search inly. Not with rashness, not 

in wrath. 
Invoking from the right hand of 

high God 
His dread irrevocable angel. Death ; 
Yet not unwarv how one spark of 

hell, 
If unextinguished, down the night 

of time 
May, like the wreckers' beacon from . 

the reefs, 
Lure many to destruction : nor 

indeed 
Unmindful of the doom by fire or 

steel 
This realm's supreme tribunals havo 

reserved 
For those that, dealing in damna- 
tion, hold 
Dark commerce with the commou 

foe of man. 



330 



TANNIIAUSER ; 



Weigh you in all its circumstance 
this crime : 

And, worthily judging, though your 
judgment be 

As sharp as conscience, be it as con- 
science clear." 

He ended : and a hitter interval 
Of silence o'er the solemn hall con- 
gealed, 
Like frost on a waste water, in a 

place 
"Where rocks confront each other. 

Marshalled round. 
Black-bearded cheek and chin, with 

hand on heft 
Bent o'er tlie pommels of their 

planteil swords 
A dreary cirque of faces ominous. 
The sullen barons on each other 

stared 
Significant. As, ere tlie storm de- 
scends 
Upon a Uruid grove, the gi-eat trees 

stand 
Looking one way, and stiller than 

their wont. 
Until the. thunder, rolling, frees the 

wind 
That rocks them altogether; even so. 
That savage circle of grim-gnarle'd 

men, 
Awliile in silence storing stormy 

thoughts. 
Stood breathless ; till a murmur 

moved them all. 
And louder growing, and louder, 

burst at Last 
To a universal irrepressible roar 
Of voices roaring, " Let him die the 

death ! " 
And, in that roar released, a hundred 

swords 
Rushed forward, and in narrowing 

circle sloped 
Sharp rims of shining horror round 

the doomed. 
Undaunted minstrel. Then a pite- 
ous cry ; * 
And from the purple baldachin down 
sprang 



The princess, gleaming like a ghost, 

and slid 
Among the swords, and standing in 

the midst 
Swept a wild arm of prohibition 

forth. 
Cowering, recoiled the angry, baffled 

surge, 
Leaviiig on either side a horrid hedge 
Of rifted glare, as wlien tlie Ked Sea 

waves 
Hung heaped and sundered, ere they 

roaring fell 
On Egypt's chariots. So there came 

a hush ; 
And in the hush her voice, heavy 

with scorn : 

" Or shall I call you men ? or beasts ? 

who seem 
No nobler than the bloodhound and 

the wolf 
Wliich scorn to prey upon tlieir 

proper kind ! 
Christians I will not call you ! who 

defraud 
Tliat nuich-misapprehended holy 

name 
Of reverence due by sucli a deed as, 

done. 
Will clash against the cliarities of 

Christ, 
And make a marred thing and a 

mockery 
Of the fair face of Mercy. You 

dull hearts. 
And liard ! have ye no pity for your- 
selves ? 
For man no pity ? man whose com- 
mon cause 
Is shamed and saddened by the stain 

that falls 
Upon a noble nature I You blind 

hands. 
Thrust out so fast to smite a fallen 

friend ! 
Did ye not all conspire, whilst yet he 

stood [forth 

The stateliest soul among you, to set 
And fix him in the foremost ranks 

of men '? 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 



ZZ^ 



Content that he, your best, should 

bear tlie brunt, 
And head the van against the seorn- 

fiil fiend 
That will not waste his weapons on 

the herd, 
r>ut saves tlieni for the noblest. 

And shall Hell 
Tnnmph through you, that triumph 

in the shame 
Of this eclipse that blots your bright- 
est out, 
And leaves you dark in his extin- 
guished liglit ? 
O, who that lives but hath within 

his heart 
Some cause to dread the suddenness 

of death ? 
And God is merciful; and suffers us, 
Even for our sins' sake ; and doth 

spare us time. 
Time to grow ready, time to take 

farewell ! 
And send us monitors and min- 
isters — 
Old age, that steals the fullness from 

the veins ; 
And griefs, that take the glory from 

the eyes ; 
And pains, that bring us timely news 

of death ; 
And tears, that teach us to be glad 

of him. 
For who can take farewell of all his 

sins 
Of such a sudden summons to the 

grave ? 
. Against high Heaven hath this man 

sinned, or you ? 
O, if it be against high Heaven, to 

Heaven 
Kemit the compt ! lest, from the 

armory 
Of the Eternal Justice ye pluck 

down. 
Heedless, that bolt the Highest yet 

witliholds 
From this low-fallen head, — how 

fallen I how low I 
Tet not so fallen, not so low fallen, 

but what 



Divine Redemption, reaching every- 

wheie, 
May reach at last even to this 

wretchedness. 
And, out of late repentance, raise it 

up 
With pardon into peace." 

She paused : she touched, 
As with an angel's finger, him 

whose pride 
Obdurate now had yielded, and he 

laid 
Vanquished by Pity, broken at her 

feet. 
She, lingering, waited answer, but 

none came 
Across the silence. And again she 

spake ; 

" O, not for him alone, and not for 

that 
Which to remember now makes life 

for me 
A wilderness of homeless griefs, I 

plead 
Before you ; but, O Princes, for 

yourselves ; 
For all that in your nobler nature 

stirs 
To vindicate Forgiveness and en- 
large 
The lovely laws of Pity I Which of 

you. 
Here in the witness of all-judging 

God, 
Stands spotless ? Which of you will 

boast himself 
More miserably injured by this 

man 
Than I, whose heart of all that lived 

in it 
He hath untenanted ? O, horrible ! 
Unheard of ! from the blesse'd lap of 

life [sins, 

To send the soul, asleep in all her 
Down to perdition ! Be not youra 

the hands 
To do this desperate wrong in sight 

of all 
The ruthful faces of the Saints in 

Heaven." 



332 



TANNHAUSER ; 



She passionately pleading thus, her 

voice 
Over their hearts moved like that 

earnest wind 
That, laboring long against some 

great nigh cloud, 
Sets free, at last, a solitary star, 
Then sinks ; but leaves the night 

not all forlorn 
Ere the soft rain o'ercoraes it. 

This long while 
"Wolfram, whose harp and voice wei"e 

overborne 
By burly brawlers in the turbulence 
That shook that stormy senate, 

stood apart 
"With vainly-vigilant eye, and writhen 

hands, 
All in mute trouble : too gentle to- 

approve, 
. Too gentle to prevent, what passed : 

and still 
Divided himself 'twlxt sharpest 

grief 
To see his friend so fallen, and a 

drear 
Strange horror of the crime whereby 

he fell. 
So, like a headland light that down 

dark waves 
Shines o'er some sinking ship it fails 

to save, 
Looked the pale singer down the 

lurid hall. 
But when the pure voice of Eliza- 
beth 
Ceased, and clear-lighted all with 

noble thoughts 
Her face glowed as an angel's, the 

sweet Bard, 
"Whose generous heart had scaled 

with that loved voice 
"Up to the lofty levels where it 

ceased. 
Stood forth, and from the dubious 

silence caught 
And carried up the purpose of her 

prayer ; [heart. 

And drew it out, and drove it to the 
And clenched it with conviction in 

the mind. 



And fixed it firm in judgment. 

From d"oep muse 
The Landgrave started, toward 

Tannhiiuser strode. 
And, standing o'er him with an eye 

wherein 
Salt sorrow and a moody pity 

gleamed, 
Spake hoarse of utterance : 

" Arise ! go forth ! 
Go from us, mantled in the shames 

which make 
Thee, stranger whom mine eye 

henceforth abhors, 
The mockery of the man I loved, 

and mourn. 
Go from these halls yet holy with 

the voice 
Of her whose intercession for thy 

sake, — 
If any sacred sorrow yet survive 
All ruined virtues, — in remorse shall 

steep 
The memory of her wrongs. For 

thee remains 
One hope, unhappiest ! reject it not. 
There goeth a holy pilgrimage to 

Home, 
Which not yet from the borders of 

our land 
Is parted ; pious souls and meek, 

whom thou 
Haply may' St join, and of those holy 

hands, 
"Which sole have power to bind or 

loose, receive 
Remission of , thy sin. For save 

alone 
The hand of Christ's high "Vicar 

ui3on earth 
A hurt so henious what may heal ? 

What save 
A soul so fallen ? Go forth upon 

thy ways, 
"Which are not om-s : for we no more 

may mix 
Congenial minds in converse sweet, 

no more [hear 

Together pace these halls, nor ever 
Thy harp as once when all was pure 

and glad, 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 



333 



Among the days which have been. 

All thy paths 
Henceforth he paths of penitence 

and prayer, 
Whilst over ours thy memory mov- 
ing makes 
A shadow, and a silence in our talk. 
Get thee from hence, O all that now 

remains 
Of one we honored ! Till the hand 

that holds 
The keys of heaven hath oped for 

thee the doors 
Of life in that far distance, let mine 

eye 
See thee no more. Go from us ! " 

Even then, 
Even whilst he spake, like some 

sweet miracle. 
From darkening lands that glun- 

mered through the doors 
Came, faintly heard along the filmy 

air 
That bore it floating near, a choral 

chant 
Of pilgrims pacing by the castle 

wall ; 
And " salvum inefac Domine'^ they 

sung 
Sonorous, in the ghostly going out 
Of the red-litten eve along the land. 

Then, like a hand across the heart 

of him 
That heard it moved that music from 

afar, 
And beckoned forth the better hope 

which leads 
A man's life up along the rugged 

road 
Of high resolve. Tannhauser mov- 
ed, as moves 
The folded serpent smitten by the 

spring 
And stirred with sudden sunlight, 

when he casts 
His spotted skin, and, renovated, 

gleams 
With novel hues. One lingering 

long look, 



Wild with remorse and vague with 

vast regrets, 
He lifted to Elizabeth. His thoughts 
Were then as those dumb creatures 

in their pain 
That makes a language of a look. 

He tossed 
Aloft his arms, and down to the 

great doors 
With drooped brows striding, groaned 

" To Eorae, to Rome ! " 
Whilst the deep hall behind him 

caught the cry 
And drove it clamorous after him, 

from all 
Its hollow roofs reverberating 

"Rome !" 

A fleeting darkness through the 

lurid arch ; 
A flying form along the glare be- 

> yond ; 
And he was gone. The scowling 

Eve reached out 
Across the hills a fiery arm, and 

took 
Tannhauser to her, like a sudden 

death. 

So ended that great battle of the 

Bards, 
Whereof some rumor to the end of 

time 
Will echo in this land. 

And, voided now 
Of all his multitxides, the mighty 

Hall, 
Dumb, dismally dispageanted, laid 

bare 
His ghostly galleries to the mournful 

moon ; 
And Night came down, and Silence, 

and the twain 
Mingled beneath the starlight. 

Wheeled at will 
The flitter-winge'd bat roimd lonely 

towers 
Wlicre, one by one, from darkening 

casements died 
The taper's shine ; the howlet from 

the hilks 



334 



TAi\iwHAUSER; 



Wliooped ; and Elizabeth, alone 

with Ni.i^ht 
And Silence, and the Ghost of her 

slain youth, 
Lay lost among the ruins of that 

day. 

As when the buffeting gusts, that 

adverse blow 
Over the Caribbean Sea, conspire 
Conflicting breaths, and, savagely 

begot, 
The fierce tornado rotatory wheels. 
Or sweeps centripetal, or, all forces 

joined. 
Whirls circling o'er the maddened 

waves, and they 
Lift up their foaming backs beneath 

the keel 
Of some frail vessel, and, careering 

high 
Over a sunken rock, with a sudden 

plunge 
Confound her, — stunned and 

strained, upon the peak 
Poising Olio moment, ere she for- 
ward fall 
To float, dishclmed, a wreck upon 

the waves : 
So rose, engendered by what furious 

blasts 
Of passion, that fell hurricane that 

swept 
Elizabeth to her doom, and left her 

now 
A helm less hull upon the savage 

seas 
Of life, without an aim, to float for- 
lorn. 

Longwhile, still shuddering from the 

shock that jarred 
The bases of her being, piteous 

wreck 
Of ruinetl hopes, upon her couch she 

lay. 
Of life and time oblivious ; all her 

mind, 
Locked in a rigid agony of grief. 
Clasping, convulsed, its unwept woe ; 

her heart 



Writhing and riven ; and her bur- 

thened brain 
Blind with the weight of tears that 

would not flow. 
But when, at last, the healing hand 

of Time 
Had wrought repair upon her shat- 
tered frame : 
And those unskilled physicians of 

the mind — 
Importunate, fond friends, a host of 

kin- 
Drew her perforce from solitude, she 

passed 
Back to the world, and walked its 

weary ways 
With dull mechanic motions, sucli as 

make 
A mockery of life. Tot gave she 

never. 
By weeping or by wailing, outward 

sign 
Of that great inward agony that she 

bore ; 
For she was not of those whose 

sternest sorrow 
Outpours in plaijits, or weeps itself 

in dew ; 
Not passionate she, nor of the happy 

souls 
Whose grief comes tempered "vdtii 

the gift of tears. 

So, through long weeks and many a 
weary moon. 

Silent and self- involved, without a 
sigh, 

She suffered. There, whence con- 
solation conies. 

She sought it — at the foot of Jesu's 
cross. 

And on the bosom of the Virgin- 
spouse, 

And in commimiou with the blessed 
Saints. 

But chief for him she prayed whose 
grievous sin 

Had Avrought her desolation ; Gcd 
besought 

To touch the leprous soul and make 
it clean ; 



OR THE BA TT/.E Of THE BARDS. 



Z3S 



And sued the Heavenly Pastor to re- 
call 
The lost sheep, wandering from the 

pleasant ways, 
Back to the pasture of the paths of 

peace. 
So thrice a day, what time the blush- 
ing morn 
Crimsoned the orient sky, and when 

the Sim 
Glared from mid-lieaven or weltered 

in the west, 
Fen'ont she prayed ; nor in the night 

forewent 
Her vigils ; till at last from prayer 

she drew 
A calm into her soul, and in that 

calm 
Heard a low whisper — lilce the breeze 

that breaks 
The deep p^ace of the forest ere the 

chirp 
Of earliest bird salutes the advent 

Day- 
Thrill through her, herald of the 

dawn of Hope. 

Theri most she loved from forth her 

leafy tower 
Listless to watch the irrevocable 

clouds 
KoU on, and daylight waste itself 

away 
Along those dreaming woods, Miience 

evermore 
She mused. " He will return ;" and 

fondly wove 
Her webs of wistful fantasy till the 

moon 
Was high in lieaven, and in its light 

slie kneeled, 
A faded watcher through the weary 

night, 
A meek, sweet statue at the silver 

shrines. 
In deep, perpetual prayer for him 

she loved. 
And from the pitying Sisterhood of 

Saints 
Haply tliat prayer shall win an angel 

down 



To be his unseen minister, and draw 
A drowning conscience from the 
deeps of Hell. 

Time put his sickle in among the 

days. 
Blithe Summer came, and into 

dimples danced 
The fair and fructifying Earth, anon 
Showering the gathered guerdon of 

her play 
Into the lap of Autumn ; Autumn 

stored 
The gift, piled ready to the palsied 

hand 
Of blind and begging Winter ; and 

when he 
Closed his well-provendered days, 

Spring ligh ly came 
And scattered sweets upon his sul- 

ien grave. 
And twice the seasons passed, the 

sisters three 
Doing glad service for their hoary 

brother. 
And twice twelve moons had waxed 

and waned, and twice 
The weary world had pilgrimcd 

round the sun. 
When from the outskirts of the land 

there came 
Rumor of footsore penitents from 

Rome 
Returning, jubilant of remitted sin. 

So chanced it, on a silent April eve 
The westering sun along the Wart- 
burg vale 
Shot level beams, and into glory 

touched 
The image of Madonna, — where it 

stands 
Hard by the common way that climbs 

the steep. — 
The image of Madonna, and the face 
Of meek Elizabeth turned towards 

the Queen 
Of Sorrows, sorrowful in patient 

prayer ; 
When, through the silence and tho 

sleepy leaves, 



4 



335 



TANNHAUSER ; 



A. breeze blew up the vale, and on 

the breeze 
Floated a plaintive music. She that 

heard, 
Trembled ; the prayer upon her 

parted lips 
Suspended hung, and one swift hand 

she pressed 
Against the palpitating heart whose 

throbs 
Confused the cunning of her ears. 

Ah God ! 
Was this the voice of her returning 

joy ? 
The psalm of shriven pilgrims to 

their homes 
Returning ? Ay ! it swells upon the 

breeze 
The '■'Nunc Dimittis^' of glad souls 

that sue 
After salvation seen to part in peace. 
Then up she sprung, and to a neigh- 
boring copse 
Swift as a startled liind, when the 

ghostly moon 
Draws sudden o'er the silvered 

heather-bells 
The monstrous shadow of a cloud, 

she sped ; 
Pausing, low-crouched, within a 

maze of shrubs, 
Whose emerald slivers fringed the 

rugged way 
So broad, the pilgrim's garments as 

they passed 
Would brush the leaves that hid her. 

And anon 
They came in double rank, and two 

by two, 
With cumbered steps, with haggard 

gait that told 
Of bodily toil and trouble, with be- 

soiled 
And tattered garments ; nathless 

with glad eyes, 
Whence looked the soul disburthened 

of her sin, 
Climbing the rude path, two by two 

they came. 
And she, that watched with what in- 

tciisest gazQ 



Them coming, saw old faces that she 

knew, 
And every face tiu-ned skywards, 

while the lips 
Poured out the heavenly psalm, and 

every soul 
Sitting seraphic in the upturned eyes 
With holy fervor rapt upon the song. 
And still they came and passed, and 

still she gazed ; 
And still' she thought, "Now comes 

he ! " and the chant 
Went heavenwards, and the file'd pil- 
grims fared 
Beside her, till their tale wellnigh 

was told. 
Then o'er her soul a sluiddering hor- 
ror crept. 
And, in that agony of mind that 

makes 
Doubt more intolerable than despair, 
With sudden hand she brushed aside 

the sprays, 
And from the thicket leaned and 

looked. The last [ken 

Of all the pilgrims stood within the 
Of her keen gaze, — save him all 

scanned, and he 
No sooner scanned than cancelled 

from her eyes 
By vivid lids swept down to lash 

away 
Him hateful, being other than she 

sought. 
So for a space, bliiul with dismay, 

she paused, 
But; he approaching, from the 

thicket leapt, 
Clutched with wrung bands his robe, 

and gasped, "The Knight 
That with you wont, returns not?" 

In his psalm 
The fervid pilgrim made no pause, 

yet gazed 
At his wild questioner, intelligent 
Of her demaiul, and shook his head 

and passed. 
Then she, with that mute answer 

stablied to the heart. 
Sprung forwai'd, clutched him yet 

once more, and cried, 



ok, THE BATTLE OF THE BAKDS. 



337 



"In Mary's name, and in the name 

of God, 
Received the knight his shrift?" 

And, once again, 
The pilgrim, sorrowful, shoolc his 

head and sighed, 
Sighed in tlie singing of his psalm, 

and passed. 

Then prone she fell upon her face, 

and prone 
Within lier mind Hope's sliattered 

fabric fell, — 
The dear and delicate fabric of frail 

Hope 
Wrouglit by tlie simple cunning of 

lier thoughts. 
That, laboring long, through many 

a dreamy day 
And many a vigil of tlie wakeful 

night, 
Piecemeal had reared it, pa'tiently, 

with pain, 
From out the ruins of her ancient 

peace. 
O ancient Peace ! that never shalt 

return ; 
O ruined hope 1 O Fancy ! over- 
fond. 
Futile artificer that build" st on air. 
Marred is thy handiwork, and thou 

shalt please 
With plastic fantasies her soul no 

more. 

So lay she cold against the callous 

ground. 
Her pale face pillowed on a stone, 

her eyes 
Wide open, fixed into a ghastly stare 
That knew no specidation ; for her 

mind 
Was dark, and all her faculty of 

tliought 
Compassionately cancelled. But she 

lay 
Not in the embrace of loyal Death, 

who keeps 
His bride forever, but in treacherous 

arms 
Of i^loep that, sated, will restore to 

(irief 



Hei', snatched a sweet space from 

his cruel clutch. 
So lay she cold against the callous 

ground. 
And none was near to heed her, as 

the sun, 
About him drawing the vast-skirted 

clouds, 
Went down behind the western hill 

to die. 

Now Wolfram, when the rumor 

reached his ears 
That, from their quest of saving 

grace returned. 
The pilgrims all within the castle- 
court 
Were gathered, flocked about by 

happy frieiuls. 
Passed from his portal swiftly, and 

i-an out 
And joined the clustering crowd. 

Full many a face. 
Wasted and wan, he recognized, and 

elapsed 
Full many a lean hand clutching at 

his own. 
Of those who, stretched upon the 

gi-ass, or propped 
Against the bowlder-stones, were 

pressed about 
By weeping women, clamorous to 

unbind 
Their sandal-thongs and bathe the 

briuse'd feet. 
Then up and down, and swiftly 

through and through. 
And round aliout, skirting the 

crowd, he huriied. 
With greetings fair to all ; till, filled 

with fear, 
Half-hopeless of his quest, yet har- 
boring hope, 
He paused perplexed besides the 

castle gales. 
There, at his side, the youngest of 

the train, 
A blue-eyed pilgrim tarried, and to 

him 
Turned Wolfram questioning of 

Tannhauser's fate, 



338 



TANNIIAUSER; 



Aiid leaniL in few words how, liis 

sin pronounced 
Deadly and irremediahle, tlie knight 
Had faded from before tlie awful 

face 
Of Christ's incense'd Vicar ; and 

none knew 
Whither he wandered, to wliat 

desolate lands, 
Hiding his anguish from the eyes of 

men. 
Then Wolfram groaned, and clai^sed 

his hands, and cried, 
"Merciful God !" and fell upon his 

knees 
In purpose as of prayer, — but, sud- 
denly, 
About the gate the crowd moved, 

and a cry 
Went up for space, when, rising, he 

beheld 
Four maids Mho on a pallet bore the 

form 
Of wan Elizabeth. The whisper 

grew 
That she had met the pilgrims, and 

had learned 
Tannhauser's fate, and fallen beside 

the way. 
And Wolfram, in the ghastly torch- 
light, saw 
The white face of the Princess 

tunned to his, 
And for a space their eyes met ; 

then she raised 
One hand towards Heaven, and 

smiled as who should say, 
" O friend, I journey unto God ; 

farewell !" 
But he could answer nothing ; for 

his eyes 
Were blindt^d by his tears, and 

through his tears 
Dimly, as in a dream, he saw lier 

borne 
Up the broad granite steps that 

wind within 
The palace ; and his inner eye, en- 
tranced, 
Saw in a vision four great Angels 

stand, 



Expectant of her spirit, at the foot 
Of flights of blinding brilliancy of 

stairs 
Innumerable, that through the riven 

skies 
Scaled to the City of the Saints of 

God. 
Then, when thick night fell on his 

soul, and all 
The vision fled, he solitary stood 
A crazed man within the castle- 
court ; 
Whence issuing, with wild eyes and 

wandering gait 
He through the darkness, groaning, 

passed away. 

All that lone night, along the 
haunted hills, 

By dizzy brinks of mountain pre- 
cipices. 

He fleeted, aimless as an unused 
wind 

That wastes itself about a wilder- 
ness. 

Sometimes from low-browed caves, 
and hollow crofts, 

Under the hanging woods there 
came and went 

A voice of wail upon the midnight 
air. 

As of a lost soul mourning ; and 
the voice 

Was still tlie voice of his remem- 
bered friend. 

Sometimes (so fancy mocked the 
fears she bred !) 

He heai'd along the lone and eery 
land 

Low demon laughters ; and a sullen 
strain 

Of horror swelled upon the breeze ; 
and sounds 

Of wizard dance, with shawm and 
timbrel, flew 

Ever betwixt waste air and wander- 
ing cloud 

O'er pathless peaks. Then, in the 
distance tolled, 

Or seemed to toll, a knoll : the 
breezes dropped : 



And, in the sudden pause, that 

passing bell 
With ghostly summons bade him 

back return 
To where, till dawn, a shade among 

the shades 
Of Wartburg, watcMng one lone 

tower, he saw 
A light that waned with all his 

earthly hopes. 
The calm Dawn came and from the 

eastern cliff. 
Athwart the glistening slopes and 

cold green copse. 
Called to him, careless of a grief 

not hers ; 
But he, from all her babbling birds, 

and all 
Her vexing sunlight, with a weary 

heart 
Drew close the darkness of the glens 

and glades 
About him, flying through the forest 

deeps. 
And day and niglit, dim eve and 

dewy dawn. 
Three times returning, went un- 

cared for by ; 
And thrice the double twilights rose 

and fell 
About a land where nothing seemed 

the same. 
At eve or dawn, as in the time gone 

by. 
But, when the fourth day like a 

stranger slipped 
To his unhonored grave, God's 

Angel passed 
Across the threshold of the Land- 
grave's hall. 
And in his bosom bore to endless 

peace 
The weary spirit of Elizabeth. 
Then, in that hour when Death with 

gentle hand 
Had drooped the quiet eyelids o'er 

the eyes 
That Wolfram loved, to Wolfram's 

heart there came 
A calmness like the calmness of a 

grave 



Walled safe from all the noisy walks 
of men 

In some green place of peace where 
daisies grow. 

His tears fell in the twilight with the 
dews, 

Soft as the dews that with the twi- 
light fell. 

When, over scarred and weather- 
wounded walls, 

Sharp-jagge'd mountain cones, and 
tangled quicks, 

Eve's spirit, settling, laid the land 
to sleep 

In skyey. trance. Nor yet less soft 
to fuse 

Memory with hope, and earth with 
heaven, to him, 

Atlnvart the harsher anguish of that 
day, 

There stole with tears the tender hu- 
man sense 

Of heavenly mercy. Through that 
milder mood. 

Like waifs that float to shore when 
storms are spent. 

Flowed to his heart old memories of 
his friend, 

O'erwoven with the weed of other 
griefs, 

Of other griefs for her that grieved 
no more — 

And of that time when, like a blaz- 
ing star 

That moves and mounts between the 
Lyre and Crown, 

Tannhiiuser shone ; ere sin came, 
and with sin 

Sorrow. And now if yet Tannhau- 
ser lived 

None knew : and if he lived, what 
hope in life ? . 

And if he lived no more, what rest 
in death ? 

But every way the dreadful doom of 
sin. 

Thus, musing much on all the mys- 
tery 

Of life, and death, and love that will 
not die, [way ; 

He wandered forth, incurious of the 



340 



TANNHAUSER ; 



Which took the wont of other days, 

and wound 
Along the valley'. Now the nodding 

star 
Of even, and the deep, the dewy 

hour 
Held all the sleeping circle of the 

hills ; 
Nor any cloud the stainless heavens 

obscured, 
Save where, o'er Horsel folded in 

the frown 
Of all his wicked woods, a fleecy 

fringe 
Of vapor veiled the slowly sinking 

moon. 
There, in the shade, the- stillness, 

o'er his harp 
Leaning, of love, and life, and death 

he sang 
A song to which from all her aery 

caves 
The mountain echo murmured in 

her sleep. 
But, as the last strain of his solemn 

song 
Died off among the solitary stars, 
There came in answer from the 

folded hills . 
A note of human woe. He turned, 

h« looked 
That way the sound came o'er the 

lonely air ; 
And, seeing, yet believed not that 

he saw, 
But, nearer moving, saw indeed 

hard by, 
Dark in the darkness of a neighbor- 
ing hill, 
Lying among the splintered stones 

and stubs 
Flat in the fern, with limbs diffused 

as one 
That, liaving fallen, cares to rise no 

more, 
A pilgrim ; all his weeds of pilgrim- 
age 
Hanging and torn, his sandals 

stained with blood 
Of bruise'd foet, and, broken in his 

hand, 



His wreathc'd staff. 

And Wolfram wistfully 
Looked in his face, and knew it not. 

" Alas ! 
Not him," he murmured, "not my 

friend !" And then, 
" What art thou, pilgrim ? whence 

thy way ? how falTn 
In this wild glen ? at this lone hour 

abroad 
When only Grief is stirring ? " Unto 

whom 
That other, where he lay in the long 

grass, 
Not rising, but with petulant ges- 
ture, *' Hence !" 
Whate'er 1 am, it skills not. Thee 1 

know 
Full Avell, Sir Wolfram of the Wil- 

lowbrook, 
The well-belove'd Singer ! " 

Like a dart 
From a friend's hand that voice 

through Wolfjam went : 
For ^Memory over all the ravaged 

form 
AVherefrom it issued, wandering, 

failed to find 
The man she mourned ; but Wol- 
fram, to the voice 
No stranger, started smit with pain, 

as all 
The past on those sharp tones came 

back to break 
His heart with hopeless knowledge. 

And he cried, 
"Alas, my briJtherl" Such a 

change, so drear, 
In all so unlike all that once he was 
Showed the lost knight Tauuhauser, 

where he lay 
Fallen across the split and morselled 

crags 
Like a dismantled ruin. And Wol- 

fraui said, 
"O lost! how comest thou, unab- 
solved, once more 
Among these valleys visited by 

dealh. 
And shadowed with the shadow of 

thy sini"' 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 



341 



WTiereto in scorn Tannhiiuser, '* Be 

at rest, 
fearful m thy righteousness ! not 

thee, 
Nor grace of thine, I seelc." 

Speaking, he rose 
The spectre of a beauty waned away; 
And, like a hollow echo of himself 
Mocking his own last words, he mur- 
mured, " Seek ! 
Alas ! what seek I here, or any- 
where ? 
Wliose way of life is like the crum- 
bled stair 
That -winds and winds about a 

ruined tower. 
And leads nowhither !" 

But Wolfram cried, " Yet turn ! 
For, as I live, I will not leave thee 

thus. 
My life shall be about thee, and my 

voice 
Lure scared Hope back to find a 

resting-place 
Even in the jaws of Death. I do 

adjure thee, 
By all that friendship yet may claim, 

declare 
That, even though unabsolved, not 

uncontrite. 
Thy soul no more hath lapsed into 

the snare 
Of that disastrous sorcery. Bid me 

hail. 
Seen through the darkness of thy 

desolation, 
Some light of purer purpose ; since 

I deem 
Not void of purpose has thou sought 

these patlis 
That range among the places of the 

past ; 
And I will make defeat of Grief 

with such [arm 

True fellowship of tears as shall dis- 
Her right hand of its scorpions ; nor 

in vain 
My prayers with thine shall batter at 

the gates 
Of Mercy, through all antagonisms 

of fate 



Forcing sharp inlet to her throne in 
Heaven." 

Whereat Tannhauser, turning tear- 
less eyes 

On Wolfraui, murmured mournful- 
ly, "If tears 

Fiery as those from fallen seraphs 
distilled. 

Or centuries of prayers for pardon 
sighed 

Sad, as of souls in purgatorial 
glooms, 

Might soften condemnation, or re- 
store 

To her, whom most on earth I have 
offended. 

The holy freight of all her innocent 
hopes 

Wrecked in this ruined venture, I 
would weep 

Salt oceans from these eyes. But I 
no more 

May drain the deluge from my heart, 
no more 

On any breath of sigh or prayer re- 
build 

The rainbow of discoven anted Hope. 

Thou, therefore, Wolfram — for her 
face, when mine 

Is dark forever, thine eyes may still 
behold — 

Tell her, if thou unblamed may'st 
speak of one 

Signed cross by the curse of God and 
cancelled out. 

How, at the last, though in remorse 
of all 

That makes allegiance void and 
valueless, 

To me has come, with knowledge of 
my loss. 

Fealty to that pure passion^ once be- 
trayed, 

Wherewith I loved, and love her." 

There his voice, 
Even as a wave that, touching on 

the shore 
To which it travelled, is shivered 

and diffused, 



-t- 



342 



TANNHAUSER . 



Sank, scattered into spray of waste- 
ful si2;hs, 

And back dissolved into the deeper 
grief. 



To whom, Wolfram, "O answer by 

the faith •' 

In which mankind are kindred art 

thou not ' 

From Rome, uuhappiest ?" " From 

Rome? ah me !" 
He muttered, " Rome is far off verv 
far, ^ 

And weary is the way !" But un 

deterred 
Wolfram renewed, "And hast thou 

not beheld 
The face of Christ's High Vicar ?" 

And again, 
" Pass on," he muttered, " what is 

that to tliee ? " 

Whereto, with sorrowful voice. 

Wolfram, " O all, ' 

And all in all to me that love mv 

friend ! " •' 

•' My friend ! " Tannhiiuser laurfied 

a bitter laugh 
Then sadlier said, "What thou 
iTr-,T ""'ouldst know, once known, 
Will cause thee to recall that wasted 

word 
And cancel all the kindness in thv 

thoughts ; 
Yet Shalt thou learn my misery, and 

learn 
The man so changed, whom once 

thou calledst ' friend,' 
That unto him the memory of him 

self 
Is as a stanger." Then, with eyes 

that swam 
True sorrow. Wolfram stretched his 

arms and sought 
To clasp Tannhiiuser to him : but 

the other 
Waved him away and with a shout 

that sprang 
Fierce with self-scorn from misery's 

deepest depth, 
"Avaunt !" he cried, the groand 
whereon I tread 



Is ground accurst I 

R.,f 1 . .,"• ^^^ ^'^^"^^ "ot *o far off 
But what thme ears, if yet they will 

may take ' 

The tale thy lips from mins have 

sought to learn ; 
Then, sign thyself, and peaceful go 

thy ways." * 

And Wolfram, for the grief that 

choked his voice, 
Could only murmur "Speak !" Bu<- 

for a while 
Tannhauser to sad silence gave his 

heart ; 
Then fetched back some far thouf^ht 
sighing, and said :— " ' 



" O Wolfram, by the love of lovlier 

days 
Believe I am not so far fallen away 
-trom all I was while we might yet 

be friends. 
But what these words, haply mv 
last, are true : ^ ^ j 

True as my heart's deep woe what 

time I felt 
Cold on my brow tears wept, and 

wept in vain, 
For me, among the scorn of altered 

friends. 
Parting that day for Rome. Re- 
member this : 
That when, in after years to which 

I pass 
A by-word, and a mockery, and no 

more. 
Thou, honored still by honorable 

men, 
Shalt hear my name dishonored, 
^ thou mav'st say. 

Greatly he grieved for that great 
sm he sinned.' 



"Ever as up the windy Alpine way. 

We halting oft by cloudy convent 
doors. 

My fellow-pilgrims warmed them- 
selves within, 

And ate and drank, and slept their 
sleep, all night, 



f 



OR, THE BA TTLE OF THE BARDS. 



343 



I, fasting, slept not ; but in ice and 
snow 

Wept, aye remembering her that 
wept for me. 

And loathed the sin within me. 
When at length 

Our way lay under garden terraces 

Strewn with their dropping blossoms, 
thick with scents, 

Among the towers and towns of 
Italy, 

Whose sumptuous airs along them, 
like the ghosts 

Of their old gods, went sighing, I 
nor looked 

Nor lingered, but with bandaged eye- 
balls prest. 

Impatient, to the city of the shrine 

Of my desired salvation. There by 
night 

We entered. There, all night, for- 
lorn I lay 

Bruised, broken, bleeding, all my 
garmenls torn, 

And all my spirit stricken with re- 
morse. 

Prostrate beneath the great cathedral 
stairs. 

So the dawn found me. From a 
hundred spires 

A hundred silvery chimes rang joy : 
but I 

Lay folded in the shadow of my 
shame, 

Darkening the daylight from me in 
the dust. 

Then came a sound of solemn music 
flowing 

To where I crouched ; voices and 
trampling feet ; 

And, girt by all his crimson car- 
dinals. 

In all his pomp the sovran Pontiff 
stood 

Before me in the centre of my 
hopes ; 

Which trembled round him into 
glorious shapes, 

Golden, as clouds that ring the risen 
sun. [fell 

And all the people, all the pilgrims, 



Low at his sacred feet, confessed 

their sins, 
And, pardoned, rose with psalms of 

jubilee 
And confident glad faces. 

Then I sprang 
To where he paused above me ; with 

Avild hands 
Clutched at the skirts I could not 

reach ; and sank 
Shiveringly back ; crying, ' O holy, 

and high, 
And terrible, that hast the keys of 

heaven ! 
Thou that dost bind and dost un- 
loose, from me, 
For Mary's sake, and the sweet 

saints', unbind 
The grievous burthen of the curse I 

bear.' 
And when he questioned, and I told 

him all 
The sin that smouldered in my blood, 

how bred, 
And all the strangeness of it, then 

his face" 
Was as the Judgment Angel's ; and 

I hid 
My own ; and, hidden from his eyes, 

I heard : 

" ' Hast thou within the nets oi 

Satan lain ? 
Hast thou thy soul to her perdition 

pledged ? 
Hast thou thy lip to Hell's En- 

chatress lent, 
To drain damnation from her reek- 
ing cup ? 
Then know that sooner from the 

withered staif 
That in my hand I hold green leaves 

shall spring, 
Than from the brand in hell-fire 

scorched rebloom 
The blossoms of salvation.' 

The voice ceased, 
And, with it all things from my 

sense. I waked 
I know not when, but all the place 

was dark : 



344 



TANNHAUSER ; 



Above .me, and about me, and with- 
in 
Darkiief^s : and from that hour by 

moon or sun 
Darkness unutterable as of death 
Where'er I walk. But death him- 
self is near ! 
O, miglit I onee more sec her, un 

seen ; unheard, 
Hear her once more : or know that 

she forgives 
Whom Heaven forgives not, nor his 

own lost peace ; 
I think that even among the netlier 

fires 
And those dark fields of Doom to 

which I pass. 
Some blessing yet would haunt me." 
Sorrowfully 
He rose among the tumbled rocks 

and leaned 
Against the dark. As one that many 

a year, 
Sundered by savage seas unsociable 
From kin and counti'y, in a desert 

isle 
Dwelling till lialf dishumanized, be- 
holds 
Haply, one eve, a far-off sail go by. 
That brings old thoughts of home 

across his heart ; 
And still the num who thinks — 

" They are all gone, 
Or changed, that loved me once, and 

I myself 
No more the same " — watches the 

dwindling speck 
With weary eyes, nor shouts, nor 

waves a hand ; 
But after, when the night is left 

alone, 
A sadness falls upon liim, and he 

feels 
More solitary in his solitudes. 
And tears come starthig fast ; so, 

tearful, stood 
Tannhiiuser, whilst his melancholy 

thoughts, [hope. 

From following up far olY a waning 
Back to himself came, one by one, 

more sad 



Because of sadness troubled. 

Yet not long 
He rested tlnis ; but murmured, 

*' Now, farewell : 
I go U> hide me darkly in the groves 
That she was wont to haunt ; where 

some sweet chance 
Haply may yield me sight of her, 

and I 
May stoop, she passed away, to kiss 

the ground 
Made sacred by her passage ere I 

die." 
But him departing Wolfram held, 

"Vain ! vain ! 
Thy footstep sways with fever, and 

thy mind 
Wavers within thy restless eyes. 

Lie here, 
O unrejecied, in my arms, and 

rest !" 

Now o'er the cmnbrous hills began 

to creep 
A thin and Avatery light : a whisper 

went 
Vague through the vast and dusky- 

volunied woods. 
And, unaccompanied, from a drowsy 

copse 
Hard by a solitary chirp came cold, 
AVhile, spent with inmost trouble, 

Tannhiiuser leaned 
His wan cheek jjillowed upon Wol- 

ram's breast, 
Calm, as in death, witli placid lids 

down locked. 
And Wolfram i)rayed within liis 

heart, "Ah, God ! 
Let liini not die, not yet, not tlaus, 

with all 
The sin upon liis spirit ! " But 

while he prayed 
Tannhiiuser raised delirious looks, 

and sighed, 
" Hearest thou not the happy songs 

they sing me ? 
Seiist tliGu not the lovely floating 

forms ? 
O fair, and fairer far than fancy 

fushioued ! 



on, THE BA TTLE OF THE BARDS. 



345 



O sweet the sweetness of the songs 

they sing ! 
For thee, . . . they sing . . . the 

goddess waits : for thee 
With braided blooms the balmy 

couch is streion, 
And loosed for thee . . . they sing 

. . . the golden zone. 
Fragrant for thee the lighted spices 

fume 
With streaming incense sweet, and 

sweet for thee 
The scattered rose, the myrtle crown, 

the cup, 
The nectar-cup for thee / . . . they 

sing. Return, 
Though late, too long desired, . . . 

I hear thera sing, 
Belay no more delights too long de- 
layed : 
Turn to thy rest ; . . . they sing . . . 

the married doves 
Murmur; the Fays soft-sparkling 

tapers tend ; 
The odors burn the purple bowers 

among ; 
And love for thee, and Beauty, 

waits! . . . they sing." 

"Ah me I ah madman !" Wolfram 

cried, " yet cram 
Thy cheated ears, nor chase with 

credulous lieart 
The fair dissembling of that dream. 

For thee 
Not roses now, but thorns ; nor 

myrtle wreath. 
But cypress rather and the graveyard 

flower 
Befitting saddest brows ; nor nectar 

poured, 
But prayers and tears ! For thee in 

yonder sl<ies 
An Angel strives with Sin and Death ! 

for thee 
Yet pleads a spirit purer than thine 

own : 
For she is cone 1 gone to the breast 

of God ! 
Thy Guardian Angel, while she 

walked the earth, 



Thine intercessionary Saint while 
now 

For thee she sues about the Throne 
of Tlirones, 

Beyond the stars, our star, Eliza- 
beth!" 

Then "Wolfram felt the shattered 

fi'ame that leaned 
Across his oreast with sudden spasms 

convulsed. 
" Dead ! is slie dead ?" Tannhauser 

murmured, ''dead ! 
Gone to the grave, so young ! mur- 
dered — ijy Tue ! 
Dead — and by my great sin! O Wol- 
fram, turn 
Tliy face from mine. I am a dying 

man ! " 
And Wolfi-am answered, "Dying? 

ah, not thus ! 
Yet make one sign thou dost repent 

the past, 
One word, but one ! to say thou hast 

abhorred 
That false she-devil that, with her 

damned charms. 
Hath wrought this ruin ; and I, 

though all the world 
Roar out against thee, ay ! though 

fiends of hell 
Howl from the deeps, yet I, thy 

friend, even yet 
Will cry them 'Peace!' and trust 

the hope I hold 
Against ail desjierateodds, and deem 

thee saved." 
Whereto Tannhauser, speaking 

faintly, " Friend, 
The fiend that haunts in ruins 

through my heart 
Will wander sometimes. In the nets 

I trip. 
When most I fret the meshes. Thesi 

spent shafts 
Are of a sickly brain that shoots 

awry, 
Aiming at spmetliing better. Bear 

with rue. 
I die.: I pass I know not whither: 

yet. know 



346 



TANNHAUSER ; 



That I die penitent. O "Wolfram, 

pray, 
Pray for my soul ! I cannot pray 

myself. 
I dare not hope : and yet I would 

not die 
Without a hope, if any hope, though 

faint 
And far beyond this darkness, yet 

may dwell 
In the dear death of Him that died 

for all." 
He whispering thus ; far in the 

Aurorean East 
The ruddy sun, uprising, sharply 

smote 
A golden finger on the airy harps 
By Morning hung within her leafy 

bowers ; 
And all about the budded dells, and 

woods 
With sparkling tasselled tops, from 

birds and brooks 
A hundred hallelujahs hailed the 

light. 
The whitehorn glistened from the 

wakening glen : 
O'er golden gravel danced the dawn- 
ing rills : 
All the delighted leaves by copse and 

glade 
Gambolled ; and breezy bleatings 

came from flocks [dew. 

Far off in pleasant pastures fed with 

But whilst, unconscious of the silent 

change 
Thus stolen around him, o'er the 

dying bard 
Hung Wolfram, on the breeze there 

came a sound 
Of mourning moving down the nar- 
row glen ; 
And, looking up, he suddenly was 

'ware 
Of four white maidens, moving in 

the van 
Of four black monks who bore upon 

her bier 
The flower-strewn corpse of young 

Elizabeth. 



And after these, from all the castled 

hills, 

A multitude of lieges and lords ; 

A multitude of men-at-arms, with 
all 

Their morions hung with mourning; 
and in midst 

His worn cheek channelled with un- 
wonted tears, 

The Landgrave, weeping for Eliza- 
beth. 

These, as the sad procession nearer 
wound, 

And nearer, trampling bare the 
fealhery weed 

To where Sir Wolfram rested o'er 
his friend, 

Tannhauser caught upon his dying 
gaze ; 

And caught, perchance, upon the in- 
ward eye, 

Far, far beyond the corpse, the bier, 
and far 

Beyond the widening circle of the 
sun. 

Some sequel of that vision Wolfram 
saw : 

The crowned Spirit by the Jaspar 
Gates ; 

The four white Angels o'er the walls 
of Heaven, 

The shores where, tideless, sleep the 
seas of Time 

Soft by the City of the Saints of God. 

Forth, with the strength that lastly 

comes to brealc 
All bonds, from Wolfram's folding 

arm he leapt, 
Clambered the pebbly path, and, 

groaning, fell [last I 

Flat on the bier of love — his bourn at 
Then, even then, while question 

question chased 
About the ruffled circle of that grief. 
And all was hubbub by the bier, a 

noise 
Of shouts and hymns brake in across 

the hills. 
That now o'erflowed with hurrying 

feet ; and came, 



OR, THE BA TTLE OF THE BARDS. 



347 



Dashed to the hip with travel, and 

dewed with haste, 
A flying post, and in his hand he 

bore 
A withered staff o'erflourished with 

green leaves ; 
Who, — followed by a crowd of youth 

and eld, 
TJiat sang to stun with sound the 

lark in heaven, 
" A miracle ! a miracle from Rome ! 
Glory to God that makes the bare 

bough green ! " — 
Sprang in the midst, and, hot for 

answer, asked 
News of the Knight Tannhauser. 

Then a monk 
Of those that, stoled in sable, bore 

the bier 
Pointing, with sorrowful hand, "Be- 
hold the man ! " 
But straight the other, " Glory be to 

God ! 
This from the Vicar of the fold of 

Christ : 
The withered staff hath flourished 

into leaves, 
The brand shall bloom, though 

burned with fire, and thou 
— Thy soul from sfn be saved I " To 

whom, with tears 
That flashed from lowering lids. 

Wolfram replied : 
*' To him a swifter message, from a 

source 
Mightier than whence thou comest, 

hath been vouchsafed. 
See these dark hands, blind eyes, and 

bloodless lips, 
This shattered remnant of a once 

fair form. 
Late home of desolation, now the 

husk 
And ruined chrysalis of a regal spirit 
That up to heaven hath parted on 

the wing ! 
But thou, to Rome returning with 

hot speed, [Christ 

Tell the high Vicar of the Fold of 
How that lost sheep his rescuing 

hand would reach, 



Although by thee unfound, is found 

indeed, 
And in the Shepherd's bosom lies at 

peace." 

And they that heard him lifted up 

the voice 
And wept. But they that stood 

about the hills 
Far off, not knowing, ceased not to 

cry out, 
"Glory to God that makes the bare 

bough green ! " 
Till Echo, from the inmost heart of 

all 
That mellowing morn blown open 

like a rose 
To round and ripen to the perfect 

noon. 
Resounded, "Glory! glory!" and 

the rocks 
From glen to glen rang, " Glory unto 

God !" 

And so those twain, severed by Life 

and Sin, 
By Love and Death united, in one 

gi-ave 
Slept. But Sir Wolfram passed into 

the wilds : 
There, with long labor of his hands, 

he hewed 
A hermitage from out the hollow 

rock, 
Wherein he dwelt, a solitary man. 
There, many a year, at nightlall or 

at dawn, 
The pilgrim paused, nor ever paused 

in vain. 
For words of cheer along his weary 

way. 
But once, upon a windy night, men 

heard 
A noise of rustling wings, and at the 

dawn 
They found the hermit parted to his 

peace. 
The place is yet. The youngest pil- 
grim knows. 
And loves it. Three gray rocks ; 

and, over these. 



348 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



A mountain ash that, mourning, 

bead by bead, 
Drops lier reci rosary on a ruined cell. 

So san.^ the Saxon Bard. And when 
he ceased. 



The women's cheeks were wet with 
tears ; but all 

The broad-blown Barons roared ap- 
plause, and llowed 

The jostling tauRards prodigal of 
wine. 



CLYTEMNESTRA. 



PERSONS OF THE DRAMA. 



Agamemnon. 

^GISTHUS. 

Ohestes. 

PlIOCIAN. 

Hekai-d. 



Clytemnestra. 
Electka. 
Cassandra. 
Chorus. 



Scene — Before the Palnce of Ar/amemnon in Anjos. 

ivhich the shield of A(jameinnon, on the wall. 
Time. — Morning. The action continues till Sunset. 



Trophies, amongst 



I. CLYTEMNESTRA. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

MoRNixci at hist ! at last the- linger- 
ing day 
Creeps o'er the dewy side of yon 

dark world. 
O dawning light already on the hills! 
O universal earth, and air, and thou, 
First freshness of the east, which art 

a breath 
Breathed from the rapture of the 

gods, who bless 
Almost all other prayers on earth 

but mine ! 
Wherefore to me is solacing sleep 

denied '? 
And honorable rest, the jicht of all ? 
So that no medicine of the slumbrous 

shell. 
Brimmed with divinest draughts of 

melody, 



Nor silence under dreamful canopy. 
Nor purple cushions of the lofty 

couch 
May lull this fever for a little while. 
WheiTfore to me, — to me, of all 

mankind. 
This retribution for a deed undone ? 
Fo.- niany men outlive their sum of 

crimes, 
And eat, and drink, and lift up thank- 
ful hands. 
And take their rest securely in the 

dark. 
Am I not innocent, — or more than 

these ? 
There is no blot of nuu'der on my 

brow. 
Nor any taint of blood upon my robe. 
— It is the thought ! it is the thought ! 

. . . ami men 
Judge us by acts ! ... as though 

one thunder-clap 




"Morning at last! at last the lingering day. 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



m 



Let all Olympus out. Unquiet heart, 
111 fares it with thee since, ten sad 

years past, 
In one wild hour of unacquainted 

joy, 
Thou didst set wide thy lonely hridal 

doors 
For a forbidden guest to enter in ! 
Last night, methought pale Helen, 

witii a frown. 
Swept by nie, murmuring, " I — such 

as thou — 
A Queen in Greece — weak-hearted, 

(woe is me !) 
Allured by love — did, in an evil hour, 
Fall off from duty. Sorrow came. 

Beware !" 
And then, in sleep, there passed a 

baleful band, 
The ghosts of all the slaughtered 

under Troy, 
From this side Styx, wlio cried, 

" For such a crime 
We fell from our fair jjalaces on 

earth. 
And wander, starless, here. For 

such a crime 
A thousand ships were launched, 

and tumbled down 
The topless towers of Ilion, though 

they rose 
To magic music, in the time of 

Gods ! " 
With such fierce tlioughls forever- 
more at war, 
Vext not alone by hankering wild 

regrets. 
But fears, yet worse, of that which 

soon nuist come, 
My heart waits armed, and from the 

citadel 
Of its liigh sorrow, sees far off dark 

shapes. 
And hears the footsteps of Necessity 
Tread near, and nearer, hand in 

hand with Woe. 
Last night the flaming Herald warn- 
ing lu-ged 
Up all "the" hills,— small time to 

pause and plan ! [to do. 

Counsel is weak : and much remains 



Tliat Agamemnon, and, if else re- 
main 

Of that enduring band who sailed 
for Troy 

Ten years ago (and some sailed 
Letlievvard), 

Find us not unprepared for their 
return. 

But — hark ! I hear the tread of nim- 
ble feet 

That sounds this way. The rising 
town is poured 

About tlie fesiive altars of the Gods, 

And from the heart of the great 
Agora, 

Lets out its gladness for this last 
night's news. 

— Ah, so it is ! Insidious, sly Re- 
port, 

Sounding oblique, like Loxiau 
oracles, 

Tells double-tongued (and with the 
selfsame voice !) 

To some new gladness, new despair 
to some. 



11. CHORUS AND CLYTEM- 
NESTHA. 

CIIOKUS. 

O dearest Lady, daughter of Tyn- 

darus ! 
With puiple flowers we come, and 

offerings — 
Oil, and wine ; and cakes of honey. 
Soothing, luuidulterate ; tapesti'ies 
Woven by white Argive maidens, 
God-descended (woven only 
ffor the liomewai-d feet of Heroes) 
To celebrate this glad intelligence 
Which last night Uie fiery courier 
Brought us, posting up from Ilion, 
Wheeled above the dusky circle 
Of the hills from lighted Ida. 
For now (Troy lying extinguisht 
Underneath a mighty Woe) 
Our King and chief of Uicn, 
Agameuuinn, ret urning 
(And witli him the hope of Argos) 



35° 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



Shall worship at the Tutelary Altars 
Of their dear native land : 
In the fane of ancient Herii, 
Or the great Lyc<ean God ; 
Immoi'taily crowned with reverend 

honor ! 
But tell us wherefore, O godlike 

woman, 
Having a lofty trouhle in your eye, 
You walk alone with loosened 

tresses '? 

CLYTEMXESTRA. 

Shall the ship toss, and yet the helm 

not heave ? 
Shall they drowse sitting at the 

lower oars, 
Wheii those that hold the middle 

benches wake ? 
He that is yet sole eye of all our 

state 
Shining not here, shall ours be shut 

in dreams ? 
But haply you (thrice happy !) prove 

not this. 
The curse of Queens, and worse 

than widowed wives— 
To wake, and hear, all niglit, the 

wandering gnat 
Sing through the silent chambers, 

while Alarm, 
In place of Slumber, by the haunted 

couch 
Stands sentinel ; or when from 

coast to coast 
Wails the night-wandering wind, or 

when o'er heaven 
Bootes hath unleashed his fiery 

hounds. 
And Night her glittering camps hath 

set, and lit 
Her watch-fires through the silence 

of the skies, 
— To count ill chances in the dark, 

and feel 
Deserted pillows wet with tears, not 

kisses. 
Where kisses once fell. 

But now Expectation 
Stirs up such restless motions of the 

blood 



As suffer not my lids to harbor 
sleep. 

Wherefore, O beloved companions, 

I wake betimes, and wander up and 
down. 

Looking toward the distant hill- 
tops. 

From whence shall issue fair fulfil- 
ment 

Of all our ten-years' hoping. For, 
behold ! 

Troy being captived, we shall see 
once more 

Those whom we loved in days of 
old. 

Yet some will come not from the 
Phrygian shore, 

But there lie weltering to the surf 
and wind ; 

Exiled from daj', in darkness blind, 

Or having crost unhappy Styx. 

And some who left us full of vigor- 
ous youth 

Shall greet us now gray-headed 
men. 

But if our eyes behold again 

Our long-expected chief, in truth, 

Fortune for us hath thrown the 
. Treble Six. 

CHORUS. 

By us, indeed, these things are also 

wisht. 
Wherefore, if now to this great son 

of Atreus 
(Having survived the woeful walls 

of Troy), 
With us, once more, the Gods permit 

to stand 
A glad man by the pillars of his 

hearth, 
Let his dear life henceforth be such 

wherein 
The Third Libation often shall be 

poured. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

And let his place be numbered with 
the Gods, [walls, 

Who overlook the Avorld's eternal 
Out of all reach of sad calamities. 



CHORUS. 

It is not well, I tliink, that men 

should set 
Too near the Gods any of mortal 

kind : 
But brave men are as Gods upon the 

earth. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

And whom Death daunts not, these 
are truly brave. 

cnoRUS. 

But more than all I reckon that man 

blest, 
Who, having sought Death nobly, 

finds it not. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

Except he find it where he does not 
seek. 

CHORUS. 

You speak in riddles. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

For so Wisdom speaks. 
But now do you with garlands 

wreathe the altars. 
While I, within, the House prepare. 
That so our King, at his returning, 
With his golden armament. 
Find us not unaware 
Of the greatness of the event. 

CHORUS. 

Soon shall we see the faces that we 

loved. 
Brother once more clasping brother, 
As in the unforgotten days : 
And heroes, meeting one another, 
(Men by glorious toils approved) 
Where once they roved, 
Shall rove again the old familiar 

ways. 
And they that from the distance 

come 
Shall feed their hearts with tales of 

home ; 



And tell the famous story of the 
war. 

Rumored son>etime from afar. 

Now shall these again behold 

The ancient Argos ; and the grove 

Long since trod 

By the fi-enzied child of Inachus ; 

And the Forum, famed of old, 

Of the wolf-destroying God ; 

And the opulent Mycente, 

Home of the Pelopidit, 

While they rove with those they 
love. 

Holding pleasant talk with us. 

O how gloriously they went, 

That avenging armament ! 

As though Olympus in her womb 

No longer did entomb 

The greatness of a bygone world — 

Gods and godlike men — 

But cast them forth again 

To frighten Troy : such storm was 
hurled 

On her devoted towers 

By the retributive Deity, 

Whosoe'er he be 

Of the Innnortal Powers — 

Or maddening Pan, if he chastise 

His Shepherd's Phrygian treach- 
eries ; 

Or vengeful Loxias ; or Zeus, 

Angered for the shame and abuse 

Of a great man's hospitality. 

As wide as is Olympus' span 
Is the power of the high Gods ; 
Who, in their golden blest abodes 
See all things, looking from the sky; 
And Heaven is hard to pacify 
For the wickedness of man. 
My heart is filled with vague fore- 
bodings. 
And opprest by unknown terrors 
Lest, in the light of so much glad- 
ness, 
Rise the shadow of ancient wrong. 
A Daemon of the double lineage 
Of Tantalus ; and the Pleisthenidse, 
Inexorable in thy mood, 
On the venerable threshold 
Of the ancient House of Pelops 



352 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



Surely is enough of blood ! 
Wiiercfore does my heart misgive 
ine ? [me ? 

Wherefore comes this doubt to grieve 
O, may no Divine Envy 
Follow home the Argive army, 
Being vexed for things ill-done 
In wilful pride of stubborn war, 
Long since, in Ihe dislant lands ! 
May no Immortal wrath pursue 
Our dear King, the Light of Argos, 
For the unliajjpy saeriiice 
Of a daughter ; working evil 
In the dark heart of a woman ; 
Or some household treachei-y, 
And a curse from kindred hands ! 



III. CL YTEMNESTRA. 

CLYTEMNESTUA. 

[lic-entcring from the house. 

To-morrow . . . ay, what if to-day ? 

. . . Well— then ? 
Why, if those tongues of flame, with 

which last night 
The land was eloquent, spoke cer- 
tain truth, 
By this perchance through green 

Saronic rocks 
Those black ships glide . . . per- 
chance . . . well, what's to 

fear ? 
'Twere well to dare the worst — to 

know the end — 
I)io soon, or live secure. What's 

left to a(hl 
To years of nights like those which 

I have known ? 
Shall I shrink now to meet one little 

hour 
Which I have dared to contemplate 

for years ? 
By all the Gods, not so ! The end 

crowns all. 
Which if we fall to seize, that's also 

lost 
Which went before : as who would 

lead a host 
Through desolate dry places, yet 

return 



In sight of kingdoius, when the Gods 
are roused 

To mark the issue ? . . . And yet, 
yet — 

I think 

Three nights ago there must have 
been sea-storms. 

The wind was wild among the Pal- 
ace towers : 

Far off upon the hideoiis Element 

I know it huddleil up the petulent 
waves. 

Whose shapeless and bewildering 
precipices 

Led to the belly of Orcus ... O, to 
slip 

Into dark Lethe from a dizzy plank, 

When even the Gods are reeling on 
the poop ! 

To drown at night, and have no sep- 
ulchre ! — 

That were too horrible ! . . . yet it 
may be 

Some easy chance, that comes with 
little pain. 

Might rid me of the liaunting of 
those eyes. 

And these wild thoughts ... To 
know he roved among 

His old companions in the Happy 
Fields, 

And ranged with heroes — I still in- 
nocent ! 

Sleep would be natural then. 

Yet will the old time 

Never return ! never those peaceful 
hours ! 

Never that careless heart ! and never 
more, 

Ah, nevermore that laughter with- 
out pain ! 

But I, that languish for repose, must 
fly it. 

Nor, save in daring, doing, taste of 
rest. 

O, to have lost all these ! To have 
bartered calm, 

And all the irrevocable wealth of 
Vi'-ith. 

And gained . . . M-hnt ? But this 
change had surely come, 



Even were all things other than they 
are. 

I blame myself o'ermuch, who should 
blame time. 

And life's inevitable loss, and fate, 

And days grown lovelier in the retro- 
spect. 

We change : wherefore look back ? 
The path to safety 

Lies forward . . . forward ever. 

[In passlnr/ toicanl the honse she 
reco'jnizes the shield of Ayamem- 
non, and 2^auses before it. 

Ha ! old shield, 
Hide up for shame that honest face 

of thine. 
Stare not so bluntly at us ... O, 

this man ! 
Why sticks the thought of him so in 

my heart '? 
If I had loved him once — if for one 

hour — 
Then were there treason in this fall- 
ing off. 
But never did I feel this wretched 

heart 
Until it leaped beneath ^gisthus' 

eyes. 
Who could have so forecounted all 

from first ? 
From that tlusht moment when his 

hand in mine 
Rested a thought too long, a touch 

too kind, 
To leave its pulse unwarmed . . . 

but 1 remember 
I dreamed sweet dreams that night, 

and slept till dawn. 
And woke with tlutterings of a 

happy thought, 
And felt, not worse, but better . . . 

And now . . . now ? 
When first a strange and novel ten- 
derness 
Quivered in these salt eyes, had one 

said then 
" O bead of dew may drag a deluge 

down : " — 
In that first pensive pause, through 

which I watched 

23 



Unwonted sadness on ^gisthus' 

brows. 
Had some one whispered, " Ay, the 

srimmei'-cloud 
Comes first: the tempest follows." — 
Well, what's past 
Is past. Perchance the worst's to 

follow yet. 
How thou art hackt, and hewn, and 

bruised, old shield ! 
Was the whole edge of the war 

against one man ? 
But one thrust more upon this dexter 

ridge 
Had quite cut through the double 

inmost hide. 
He must have stood to it well ! O, he 

was cast 
r the mould of Titans : a magnifi- 
cent man, 
With head and shoulders like a 

God's. He seemed 
Too brimful of this merry vigorous 

life 
To spill it all out at one stab o' the 

sword. 
Yet that had helped much ill ... O 

DesVlny 
Makes cowards or makes culprits of 

us all ! 
Ah, had some Trojan weapon . . . 

Fool ! fool ! fool ! 
Surely sometimes the unseen Eume- 

nides 
Do prompt our musing moods with 

wicked hints, 
And lash us for our crimes ere we 

commit them. 
Here, round this silver boss, he cut 

my name, 
Once — long ago : he cut it as he lay 
Tired out with brawling pastimes — 

prone — his limbs 
At length diffused — his head droopt 

in my lap — 
His spear iflung by : Electra by the 

hearth 
Sat with the young Orestes on her 

knee ; 
While he, with an old broken sword, 

hacked out 



354 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



These crooked cliaracters, and 

laughed to see 
(Sprawloii from the unused strength 

of liis large hands) 
The marks make Clytemxestra. 

How he laughed ! 
uEgisthus' hands are smaller. 

Yet I know 
That matrons envied me my hus- 

hand's strength. 
And I remember when he strode 

among 
The Argive crowd he topped them 

by a liead, 
And tall men stood wide-eyed to 

look at him, 
Where his great plumes went tossing 

up and down 
The brazen prores drawn out upon 

the sand. 
War on his front was graved, as on 

thy disk. 
Shield ! which he left to keep his 

memory 
Grand in men's mouths : that some 

revered old man 
Winning to this the eyes of our hot 

youth, 
Might say, '' 'Twas here, and here — 

this dent, and that — 
An such, and such a field (whicli we 

remember) [time. 

That Aganiemn in, in the great okl 
Held up the battle." 

Now lie there, and rest! 
Thy uses all have end. Thy master's 

home 
Should harbor none but friends. 

O triple brass, 
Iron, and oak ! the blows of blund- 
ering men 
Clang idly on you : what fool's 

strength is yours ! 
For, surely, not the adamantine 

tunic 
Of Ares, nor whole shells of blazing 

plates, 
Nor ashen spear, nor all the cum- 
brous coil 
Of seven Inills' hides may guard the 

strongest king 



From one defenceless woman's quiet 
hate. 

What noise was that ? Where can 

^gisthus be ? 
^^gisthus ! — my ^gisthus ! . . . 

Tliere again ! 
Louder, and longer — from the 

Agora — 
A mighty shout : and now I see i' 

the air 
A rolling dust the wind blows near. 

^gisthus ! 

much I fear . . . this Avild-willed 

race of ours 
Doth ever, like a young unbroken 

colt. 
Chafe at the straightened bridle of 

our Stat e — 
If they should find him lone, irreso- 
lute, 
As is his wont ... I know he lacks 

the eye 
And forehead wherewith crowned 

Capacity 
Awes rash Rebellion back. 

Again that shout ! 
Gods keep ^li^gisthus safe ! myself 

M'ill front 
This novel storm. How my heart 

leaps to danger ! 

1 have been so long a pilot on rough 

seas. 
And almost rudderless ! 

O yet 'tis much 
To feel a power, self-centred, self- 
assured. 
Bridling a glorious danger ! as when 

one 
That knows tlie nature of the 

elements 
Guides some frail plank with sublime 

skill that wins 
Progress from all obstruction ; and, 

erect. 
Looks bold and free down all the 

dripping stars. 
Hearing the "hungry storm boom 

baffled by. 
^gisthus !. . . hark ! . . . ^gisthus! 

. . . there . . . JEgisthus I 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



355 



I would to all the Gods I knew him 


CLYTEMNESTRA. 


safe ! 


So soon ! 


"Who comes this way, guiding his 


The thought's outsped by the 


racing feet 


reality. 


Safe to us, like a nimble charioteer ? 


And halts agape . . . the King — 


IV. CLYTEMNESTRA. HERALD. 


HERALD. 


CLYTEMNESTRA. 


How she is moved. 




A noble woman ! 


Now, gloom-bird ! are there prod- 




igies about ? 


CLYTEMNESTRA. 


Wliat new ill-thing sent thee before? 


Wherefore beat so fast, 


HERALD. 


Thou foolish heart? 'tis not thy 


Queen — 


master — 


CLYTEMNESTRA. 






HERALD. 


Speak, if thou hast a voice ! I 


Truly 


listen. 


She looks all over Agamemnon's 


HERALD. 


mate. 


Queen — 


CLYTEMNESTRA. 


CLYTEMNESTRA. 


Destiny, Destiny ! The deed's half 


Hath an ox trodden on thy tongue ? 


done. 


. . . Speak then ! 


HERALD. 


HERALD. 


She will not speak, save by that 




brooding eye 


Queen (for haste hath caught away 


Whose light is language. Some great 


my breath), 


thought, I see, 


The King is coming. 


Mounts up the royal chambers of 

her blood. 
As a Wni mounts his palace ; holds 


CLYTEMNESTRA 


Say again — the King 


high pomp 


Is coming — 


In her Olympian bosom ; gains her 




face. 


HERALD. 


Possesses all her noble glowing 


Even now, the broad sea-fields 


cheek 


Grow white with flocks of sails, and 


With sudden state ; and gathers 


towards the west 


grandly up 


The sloped horizon teems with ris- 


Its slow majestic meanings in her 


ing beaks. 


eyes ! 


CLYTEMNESTRA. 


CLYTEMNESTRA. 


The people know this ? 


So quick this sudden joy hath taken 


HERALD. 


us, 
I scarce can realize the sum of it. 


Heard you not the noise ? 


You say the King comes here, — the 


For soon as this winged news had 


King, my husband, 


touch-^ the gate 


Whom we'have waited for ten years, 


The whole land shouted in the sun. 


—0 joy ! 



35^ 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



Pardon our seeming roughness at the 

first. 
Hope, that will often fawn upon 

despair 
And flatter desperate chances, when 

the event 
Falls at our feet, soon takes a quer- 
ulous tone, 
And jealous of that perfect joy she 

guards 
(Lest the ambrosial fruit by some 

rude hand 
Be stol'n away from her, and never 

tasted), 
Barks like a lean watch-dog at all 

who come. 
But now do you, with what good 

speed you may, 
Make known this glad intelligence to 

all. 
Ourselves, within, as best befits a 

wife 
And woman, will prepare my hus- 
band's house. 
Also, 1 pray you, summon to our 

side 
Our cousin, ^Egisthus. AVe would 

speak with him. 
We would that our own lips should 

be the first 
To break these tidings to him ; so 

obtaining 
New joy by sharing his. And, for 

yourself. 
Receive our gratitude. For this 

great news 
Henceforth you hold our royal love 

in fee. 
Our fairest fortunes from this day I 

date, 
And to the House of Tantalus new 

honor. 



She's gone ! With what a majesty 

she filled 
The whole of space ! The statues of 

the Gods 
Are not so godlike. She has Here's 



eyes, 
And looks immortal I 



V. CLYTEMNESTRA. CHORUS. 

CLYTEMNESTRA (os Hhe asccnds the 

ste^js of the Palace). 

So . . . while on the verge 
Of some wild purpose we hang 

dizzily. 
Weighing the danger of the leap 

below 
Against the danger of retreating 

steps, 
Upon a sudden, some forecast event, 
Issuing full-armed from Councils of 

the Gods, 
Strides to us, plucks us by the liair, 

and hurls 
Headlong pale conscience to the 

abyss of crime. 
Well — 1 shrink not. 'Tis but a leap 

in life. 
There's fate in this. Why is he 

hei'e so soon ? 
The sight of whose abhorrc'd eyes 

Mi 11 add 
Whatever lacks of strength to this 

resolve. 
Away with shame ! I have had 

onough of it. 
What's here for .shame ? . . . tlie 

weak against the strong? 
And if the weak be victor ? . . . what 

of that ? 
Tush ! . . . there, — my soul is set 

to it. What need 
Of argument to justify an act 
Necessity compels, and must ab- 
solve ? 
I liave been at play with scruples — 

like a girl. 
Now they are all flung by. I have 

talked with Crime 
Too long to play the prude. These 

thoughts have been 
Wild guests by night. Now I shall 

dare to do 
That which I did not dare to 

think . . . O, now 
I Imow myself ! Crime's easier than 

we dream. 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



357 



CIIOIIUS. 

upon the everlasting hills 
Throned Justice works, and waits. 
Between the shooting of a star, 
That falls unseen on summer nights 
Out of the bosom of the dark, 
And the magnificent march of War, 
Rolled from angry lands afar 
Round some dobine'd city-gates. 
Nothing is to her unknown ; 

Nothing unseen. 

Upon her hills she sits alone, 

And in the balance of Eternity 

Poises against the What-has-been 

The weight of What-shall-be. 

She sums the account of human ills. 

The gi-eat world's hoarded wrongs 

"and rights 
Are in her treasures. She will mark, 
With inward-searching eyes sublime, 
The frauds of Time. 
Tlie empty future years she fills 
Out of the past. All human wills 
Sway to her on her reachless heights. 

Wisdom she teaches men, with 

tears. 
In the toilful school of years : 
Climbing from event to event. 
And, being patient, is content 
To siretcli her siglitless arms about. 
And find some human instrument, 
From many sorrows to work out • 
Her doubtful, far accomplishment. 

She the two Atridaj sent 

Upon Ilion : being intent 

The heapt-up wrath of Heaven to 

move 
Against the faithless Phrygian crime. 
Them the Thunder-bird of Jove, 
Swooping sudden from above, 
Summoned to fates sublime. 

She, being injured, for the sake 
Of her, the often-wedded wife, 
(Too loved, and too adoring !) 
Many a brazen band did break 
In many a breathless battle-strife ; 
Many a noble life did take ; 



Many a headlong agony. 

Frenzied shout, and frantic cry, 

For Greek and Trojan storing. 

When, the spear in the onset being 
shivered. 

The reeling ranks were rolled to- 
gether 

Like mad waves mingling in windy 
weather, 

Dasht fearfully over and over each 
other. 

And the plumes of Princes were 
tossed and thrust. 

And dragged about in tlie sliameful 
dust ; 

And tlie painful, panting breath 

Came and went in the tug of death : 

And the sinews were loosened, and 
the strong knees stricken : 

And the eyes began to darken and 
thicken : 

And the arm of the mighty and ter- 
rible quivered. 

O Love ! Love ! Love ! How terri- 
ble art thou ! 

How terrible ! 

O, what hast thou to do 

With men of mortal years, 

Who toil below. 

And have enougli of griefs for tears 
to flow ? 

O, range in higher spheres ! 

Hast thou, O hast thou, no diviner 
hues 

To paint thy wings, but must trans- 
fuse 

An Iris-light from tears ? 

For human hearts are all loo weak 
to hold thee. 

And how, O Love, sliall haman arms 
infold thee ? 

There is a seal of sorrow on thy 
brow. 

There is a deadly fire in thy breath. 

With life thou lurest, yet thou givest 
death. 

O Love, the Gods are weak by reason 
of thee ; 

And many wars have been upon the 
earth. 



358 



CL YTEMNESTRA . 



Thou art the sweetest source of 

saltest sorrows. 
Thy blest to-days bring such Tinblest 

to-morrows ; 
Thy softest hope makes saddest 

memory. 
Thou hadst destruction in thee from 

the birth ; 
Incomprehensible ! 

O Love, thy brightest bridal gar- 
ments 

Are poisoned, like that robe of ag- 
onies 

Which Deianira wove for Hercules, 

And, being put on, turn presently 
to cerements ! 

Thoii art unconquered in the fight. 

Tliou rangest over land and sea. 

O let the foolish nations be ! 

Keep thy divine desire 

To upheave mountains or to kindle 
fire 

From the frore frost, and set the 
world alight. 

"Why make thy red couch in the 
damask cheek ? 

Or light thy torch at languid eyes ? 

Or lie entangled in soft siglis 

On pensive lips that will not speak ? 

To sow tlie seeds of evil things 

In the hearts of headstrong kings ? 

Pi'epariiig many a khidred strife 

For the fearful future hour ? 

O leave the wretched race of man. 

Whose days are but the dying sea- 
sons' span ; 

Vex not his painful life ! 

Make thy immortal sport 

In heaven's high court, 

And coi)e Avith Gods that are of 
equal power. 

VI. ELECTRA. CHORUS. CLY- 
TEMNESTEA. 

ELECTRA. 

Now is at hand the hour of retribu- 
tion. 



For my ffither, at last returning, 
In great power, being greatly in- 
jured. 
Will destroy the base adulterer, 
And efface the shameful Past. 

CHORUS. 

O child of the Godlike Agamemnon! 
Leave vengeance to the power of 

Heaven ; 
Nor forestall with impious footsteps 
The brazen tread of black Erinnys. 



Is it, besotted with the adulterous 

sin, 
Or, as with flattery pleasing present 

power, 
Or, being intimidate, you speak these 

words ? 

CHORUS. 

Nay, but desiring justice, like your- 
self. 

ELECTRA. 

Yet Justice ofttimes uses mortal 



But flings aside her tools when work 
is done. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

O dearest friends, inform me, went 

this ivay 
^gisthus 'r 



Even now, hurrying hitherward 
I see him walk, with irritated eyes. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

A reed may show which way the 

tempest blows. 
That face is pale, — those brows are 

dark ... ah ! 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



359 



VII. ^GISTHUS. CLYTEMNES- 
TKA. 

^GISTHUS. 

Agamemnon — 

CL YTEMNESTRA. 

My husband . . . well ? 

^GISTHUS. 

("Wliom may the great Gods curse !) 
Is scarce an hour hence. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

Then that hour's yet saved 
From sorrow. Smile, ^gisthus — 

^GISTHUS. 

Hear me speak. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

Not as your later wont has been to 

smile — 
Quick, fierce, as though you scarce 

could hurry out 
The wild thing fast enough ; for 

smiling's sake, 
As if to show you could smile, though 

in fear 
Of what might follow, — but as first 

you smiled 
Years, years ago, wlien some slow 

loving thought 
Stole down your face, and settled on 

your iips. 
As though a sunbeam halted on a 

rose, . 
And mixed with fragrance, light. 

Can you smile still 
Just so, ^Egisthus ? 

.EGISTHUS. 

These are idle words. 
And like the wanderings of some 

fevered brain : 
Extravagant x^hrases, void of import, 

wild. 



CLYTEMXESXRA. 

Ah, no ! you cannot smile so, more. 
Nor I ! 

^GISTHUS. 

Hark ! in an hour the King — 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

Hush ! listen now, — 
I hear, far down yon vale, a shepherd 

piping 
Hard by his milk-white flock. The 

lazy tilings ! 
How quietly they sleep or feed among' 
The dry grass and the acanthus 

there ! . . . and he. 
He hath flung his faun-skin by, and 

white-ash stick. 
You hear his hymn ? Something of 

Dryope. 
Faunus, and Pan ... an old wood 

tale, no doubt ! 
It makes me think of songs when I 

was young 
I used to sing between the valleys 

there. 
Or higher up among the red ash- 
berries, 
Where the goats climb, and gaze. 

Do you remember 
That evening when we lingered all 

alone. 
Below the city, and one yellow star 
Shook o'er yon lemple ? . . . ah, 

and you said then, 
" Sweet, should this evening never 

change to night, 
But pause, and pause, and stay just 

so, — yon star 
Still steadfast, and the moon behind 

the hill. 
Still rising, never risen, — would this 

seem strange ? 
Or should we say. ' why halts the 

day so late .'" " 
Do you remember ? 

uEGISTHUS. 

Woman ! woman ! this 
Surpasses frenzy ! Not a breath of 
time 



360 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



Between us and the clutch of 

Destiny, — 
Ah-eady sound there footsteps at our 

heels, 
Already comes a heat against our 

cheek, 
Already fingers cold among our hair. 
And you speal^ lightly thus, as 

though the day 
Lingered loAvard nuptial hours ! . . . 

awake ! arouse ! 

CLYTEMXESTRA. 

I do wake . . . well, the King — 

^GISTIIUS. 

Even while we speak 
Draws near. And we— 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

Must meet him. 
^GISTHUS. 

Meet ? ay . . . how ? 

CLYTEMXESTRA. 

As mortals should meet fortune — 
calmly. 

^GISTIIUS. 

Quick ! 
Consult ! consult ! Yet there is time 

to choose 
The path to follow. 

CLYTEMXESTRA. 

I have chosen it 
Long since. 

^GISTIIUS. 

How ?— 
CLYTEMXESTRA. 

O, have we not had ten years 
To ripen counsel, and mature re- 
solve ? 
t's to add now ? 



^GISTIIUS. 

I comprehend ycu not. 
The time is plucking at our sleeve. 

CLYTEMXESTRA. 

^gisthus, 
There shall be time for deeds, and 

soon enough, 
Let that come when it may. And it 

may be 
Deeds must be done shall shut and 

shrivel up 
All quiet thoughts, and quite pre- 
clude repose 
To the end of time. Upon this 

awful strait 
And promontory of our mortal life 
We stand between what was, and is 

not yet. 
The Gods allot to us a little space, 
Before the contests which must soon 

begin, 
For calmer breatliing. All before 

lies dark, 
And difficult, and perilous, and 

strange ; 
And all behind . . . What if we take 

one look. 
One last long lingering look (before 

Despair, 
The shadow- of failure, or remorse, 

which often 
Waits on success, can come 'twixt us 

and it. 
And darken all) at that which yet 

must seem 
Undimmed in the long retrospect of 

years, — 
The beautiful imperishable Past ! 
Were this not natural, being inno- 
cent now 
—At least of that which is the greater 

crime ? 
To-night we sliall not be so. 

^GISTHUS. 

Ah, to-night ! 

CLYTEMXESTRA. 

All will be done which now the Goda 

foresee. 
The sun shines still. 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



361 



^GISTHUS. 

I oft have marked some day 
Begin all gold in its flusht orient. 
With si^lendid promise to the wait- 
ing worlcl, 
And turn to blackness ere the sun 

ran down. 
So draws our love to its dark close. 
To-night— 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

Shall bring onr bridals, my Beloved ! 

For, either 
Upon the melancholy shores of 

Death 
(One shadow near the doors of Pluto) 

greeted 
By pale Proserpina, our steps shall 

be, 
Or else, secure, in the great empty 

pala 
We shall sleep crowned — no noise to 

startle us — 
And Argos silent round us — all our 

own ! 

^GISTHUS. 

In truth I do not dare to think this 

thing. 
For all the Greeks will hate us. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

What of that ? 
If that they do not harm us, — as who 
shall ? 

^GISTHUS. 

Moreover, though we triumph in the 

act 
(And we may fail, and fall) we shall 

go down 
Covered with this reproach into the 

tomb. 
Hunted by all the red Euraenides ; 
And, in the end, the ghost of him we 

slew. 
Being beforehand there, will come 

between 
Us and the awful Judges of the 

dead ! 



And no one on this earth will piay 

for us ; 
And no hand will hang garlands on 

our urns. 
Either of man, or maid, or little 

child ; 
But we shall be dishonored. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

O faint heart ! 
Wlien this poor life of ours is done 

with — all 
Its foolish days put by — its bright 

and dark — 
Its praise and blame — rolled quite 

away — gone o'er 
Like some brief jjageant — will it stir 

us more. 
Where we are gone, how men may 

hoot or shout 
After our footsteps, then the dust 

and garlands 
A few mad boys and girls fling in 

the air 
Wlien a great host is passed, can 

cheer or vex 
The minds of inen already out of 

sight 
Toward other lands, with ptean and 

with pomp 
Arrayed near vaster forces ? For 

the future. 
We will smoke hecatombs, and build 

new fanes. 
And be you sure the gods deal 

leniently 
With those who grapple for their 

life, and pluck it 
From the closed grip of Fate, albeit 

perchance 
Some ugly smutch, some drop of 

blood or so, 
A spot here, there a streak, or stain 

of gore, 
Should in the contest fall to them, 

and mar 
That life's original whiteness. 

.^GISTIIUS. 

Tombs have tongues 



36; 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



That talk in Hades. Think it ! 

Dare we hope, 
This done, to be more happy ? 

CLYTEMNESTKA. 

My Beloved, 
"We are not happy, — we may never 

be, 
Perchance, again. Y^ it is much to 

think 
We have been so : and even though 

we must Aveep, 
We have enjoyed. 

The roses and Ihe thorns 
We have plucked togetlier. We 

have proved both, tjay, 
Was it not worth the bleeding hands 

they left vis 
To have won such flowers ? And if 

'twere possible 
To keep them still, — keep even the 

withered leaves, 
Even the withered leaves are worth 

our care. 
We will not tamely give up life, — 

such life ! 
What though the years before, like 

those behind, 
Be dark as clouds the thunder sits 

among, 
Tipt only here and there with a wan 

gold 
More briglit for rains between ? — 

'tis much, — 'tis more, 
For we shall ever think "the sun's 

behind. 
The sun must shine before the day 

goes down ! " 
Anything better than the long, long 

night. 
And that perpetual silence of the 

tomb ! 
'Tis not for happier hours, but life 

itself 
Which may bi-ing happier hours, we 

strike at Fate. 
Why, though from all the treasury 

of the Past 
'Tis but one solitary gem we save — 
One kiss more such as we have kist, 

one smile, 



One more embrace, one night more 

such as those 
Which we have sliared, how costly 

were the prize, 
How richly worth the attempt ! In- 
deed, 1 know. 
When yet a child, in those dim 

pleasant dreams 
A girl will dream, perchance in 

twilit hours. 
Or under eve's first star (when we 

are young 
Happiness seems so possible, — so 

near ! 
One says, "it must go hard, but I 

shall find it !" ) 
Ofttimes I mused, — "My life shall 

be my own, 
To make it, what I will." It is their 

fault 
(I thouiiht) who miss the true de- 
lights. I thought 
Men might have saved themselves : 

they flung away. 
Too easily abasht, life's opening 

promise : 
But all things will be different for 

me. 
For I felt life so strong in me ! 

indeed 
I was so sure of my own power to 

love 
And to enjoy, — I had so nutch to 

give, 
I said, "be sure it must win some- 
thing back !" 
Youth is so confident ! And though 

I saw 
All women sad, — not only those I 

knew. 
As Helen (whom from youth I 

knew, nor ever 
Divined that sad impenetrable smile 
Which oft vo.ild darken through 

her lustrous eyes, 
As drawing slowly down o'er her 

cold cheek 
The yellow braids of odorous hair, 

she turned 
From JNIenelaus praising her, and 

sighed, — 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



363 



That was before he, flinging bitterly 

down 
The trampled parsley-crown and 

imdrained goblet, 
Cnrsed before all the Gods his sud- 
den shame 
And young Hermione's deserted 

youth !) 
Not only her, — but all whose lives I 

learned, 
Medea, Deianira, Ariadne, 
And many others, — all weak, 

wronged, opprest, 
Or sick and sorrowful, as I am 

now, — 
Yet in their fate I would not see my 

own, 
Xor grant allegiance to that genei-al 

law 
From which a few, I knew a very 

' few, 
With whom it seemed I also might 

be numbered. 
Had yet escaped securely : — so ex- 
empting 
From this world's desolation everj^- 

where 
One fate — my own ! 

Well, that was foolish ! Now 
I am not so exacting. As we move 
Further and further down the path 

of fate 
To the sure tomb, we yield up, one 

by one, 
Our claims on Fortune, till with 

each new year 
/We seek less and go further to ob- 
tain it. 
'Tis the old tale, — aye, all of us 

must learn it ! 
But yet I would nof empty-handed 

stand 
Before the House of Hades. Still 

there's life. 
And hope with life ; and much that 

may be done. 
Look lip, O thou most dear and 

cherisht head ! 
We'll strive still, conquering ; or, if 

falling, fall 
In sight of grand results. 



^GISTHUS. 

May these things be ! 

I know not. All is vague. I should 
be strong 

Even were you weak. 'Tis other- 
wise — I see. 

No path to safety sure. We have 
done ill things. 

Best let the past be past, lest new 
griefs come. 

Best we part now. 

CLYTEMNESTKA. 

Part ! what, to part from thee ! 
Never till death, — not in death even, 
part ! 

^GISTHUS. 

But one course now is left. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

And that is — 

^GISTHUS. 

Flight. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

Coward ! 

^GISTHUS. 

I care not. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

Flight ! I am a Queen. 
A goddess once you said, — and why 

not goddess '? 
Seeing the Gods are mightier than 

we 
By so much more of courage. O, 

not I, 
But you, are mad. 

^GISTHUS. 

Nay, wiser than I was. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

And you will leave me ? 

^GISTHUS. 

Not if you Avill come. 



3^4 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



CLYTEMNESTRA. 

This was the Atlas of the world I 
built I 

^GISTHUS. 

Flight ! . . . yes, I know not . . . 

somewhere . . . anywhere. 
You come ? . . . you come not ? 

well ? ... no time to pause ! 

CLYTEMNESTKA. 

And this is he — this he, the man I 

loved ! 
And this is retribution ! O my 

heart ! 
O Agamemnon, how art thou 

avenged ! 
And I have done so much for him ! 

. . . would do 
So mvich ! . . . a universe lies 

ruined here. 
Now by Apollo, be a man for once ! 
Be for once strong, or be forever 

weak ! 
If shame be dead, and honor be no 

more, 
No more ti-ue faith, nor that which 

in old time 
Made us like Gods, sublime in our 

high place. 
Yet all surviving instincts warn 

from flight. 
Flight ! — O, impossible ! Even now 

the steps 
Of fate are at the threshold. "Which 

way fly ? 
For every avenue is barred by death. 
Will these not scout your flying 

• heels ? If now 
They hate us powerful, will they 

love us weak ? 
No land is safe ; nor any neighbor- 
ing king 
Will harbor Agamemnon's enemy. 
Reflect on Troy ; her ashes smoul- 
der yet. 

^GISTIIUS. 

Her words compel me with their aw- 
ful truth. 



For so would vengeance hound and 
earth us down. 

CLYTEMXESTRA. 

If I am weak to move you by that 

love 
You swore long since — and sealed it 

with false lips ! — 
Yet lives there nothing of the ambi- 
tious will ? 
Of those proud plots, and dexterous 

policy, 
On which you builded such high 

hopes, and swore 
To rule this people Agamemnon 

rides ; 
Supplant him eminent on his own 

throne. 
And push our power through Greece? 

.^GISTHUS. 

The dream was great. 
It was a dream. We dreamt it like 
a king. 

CLYTEMNESTKA. 

Ay, and shall so fulfil it — like a 
King ! 

Who talks of flight ? For now, be- 
think you well. 

If to live on, the byword of a world, 

Be any gain, even such flight offers 
not. 

Will long- armed Vengeance never 
find you out 

When you have left the weapon in 
her hands ? 

Be bold, and meet her ! Who fore- 
stall the bolts 

Of heaven, the Gods deem worthy 
of the Gods. 

Success is made the measm'e of our 
acts. 

And, think, ^gisthus, there has 
been one thought 

Before us in the intervals of years, 

Between us ever in the long dark 
nights, 

When, lying all awake, we heard the 
wind. 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



365 



Do you shrink then ? or, only closer 
drawing 

Your lips to mine, your arms about 
my neck, 

Say, " Who would fear such chances, 
when he saw 

Behind them such a prize for him as 
this?" 

Do you shrink now ? Dare you put 
all this from you ? 

Revoke the promise of those years, 
and say 

This prospect meets you unprepared 
at last '? 

Our motives are so mixt in their be- 
ginnings 

And so confused, we recognize them 
not 

Till they are grown to acts ; but 
ne'er were ours 

So blindly wov'n, but what we both 
untangled 

Out of the intricacies of the heart 

One purpose : — being found, best 
grapple to it. 

For to conceive ill deeds yet dare not 
do them. 

This is not virrtue, but a twofold 
shame. 

Between the culprit and the demi- 
god 

There's but one difference men re- 
gard — success. 

The w'eakly-wicked shall be doubly 
damned ! 

uEGISTHUS. 

I am not weak . . . what will you ? 

. . . O, too weak 
To bear this scorn ! . . . She is a 

godlike fiend, 
And hell and heaven seem meeting 

in her eyes. 

CLYTEJINESTRA. 

Those who on perilous ventures 

once embark 
Should burn their ships, nor ever 

dream return. 
Better, though all Olympus marched 

ou us. 



To die like fallen Titans, scorning 

Heaven, 
Than live like slaves in scorn of our 

own selves ! 

^GISTHUS. 

We wait then ? Good I and dare 

this desperate chance. 
And if we fall (as we, I think, must 

fall) 
It is but some few sunny hours we 

lose, 
Some few bright days. True ! and 

a little less 
Of life, or else of wrong a little more. 
What's that ? For one shade more 

or less the night 
Will scarce seem darker or lighter, 

— the long night ! 
We'll fall together, if we fall ; and 

if— 
O, if we live ! — 

CI.YTEMNESTKA. 

Ay, that was noblier thought. 

Now you grow back into yourself, 
your true self. 

My King! my chosen ! my glad care- 
less helpmate 

In the old time ! we shared its pleas- 
ant days 

Koyally, did we not ? How brief 
they were ! 

Nor will I deem you less than what 
I know 

You have it in you to become, for 
this 

Strange freakisli fear, — this passing 
brief alarm. 

Do I not know the noble steed will 
start 

Aside, Scared lightly by a straw, a 
shadow, 

A thorn-bush in the way, while the 
dull mule 

Plods stupidly adown the dizziest 
paths ? 

And oft indeed, such trifles will dis- 
may 

The finest and most eager spirits, 
which yet 



366 



CL YTEMNESTRA, 



Daunt not a duller mind. O love, 

be sure 
Wliate'er betide, wlietlier for well or 

ill, 
Thy fate and mine are bound up in 

one skein ; 
Clotho must cut them both insep- 

arate. 
You dare not leave me — had you 

Avings for flight ! 
You shall not leave me ! You are 

mine, indeed, 
(As I am yours !) by my strong right 

of grief. 
Not death together, but together 

life! 
Life — life with safe and honorable 

years, 
And power to do Avith these tliat 

which we would ! 
— His lips comprest — his eye dilates 

— he is saved ! 
O, when strong natures into frailer 

ones 
Have struck deep root, if one exalt 

not both. 
Both must drag down and perish ! 

^GISTHUS. 

If we should live — 

CLYTEM.NESTRA. 

And we shall live. 

^GISTHUS. 

Yet . . . yet— 

CLYTEMNESTKA. 

What ! shrinking still ? 
I'll do the deed. Do not stand off 
from me. 

^GISTHUS. 

Terrible Spirit ! 

CLYTEMNESTEA. 

Nay, not terrible. 
Not to thee terrible — O say not so ! 
To thee I never have been anything 



But a weak, passionate, unhappy 

woman, 
(O woe is me !) and now you fear 

me — 



No, 



^GISTHUS. 

But rather worship. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

O my heart, my heart, 
It sends up all its anguisa in this 

cry- 
Love me a little? 

JEGISTHtrS. 

What a spell she hn5 
To sway the inmost courses of the 

soul ! 
My spirit is held up to such a height 
I dare not breathe. How finely sits 

this sorrow 
L^pon lier, like the garment of a 

God! 
I cannot fatliora her. Does the 

same birth 
Bring forth the monster and the 

demigod ? 

CLYTEMXESTRA. 

I will not doubt ! All's lost, if love 

be lost, — 
Peace, honor, innocence, — gone, 

gone ! all gone 
And you, too — you, poor baffled 

crownless schemer. 
Whose life my love makes royal, 

clothes in purple. 
Establishes in state, without me, 

answer me, 
What should you do but perish, as is 

fit? 
O love, you dare not cease to love 

me now ! 
We have let the world go by lis. We 

have trusted 
To ourselves only : if we fail our- 
selves 
What shall avail us now? Without 

my love 
What rest for you but universal 

hate, 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



367 



And Agamemnon's sword ? Ah, ^- - 

— you love nie, 
Must love me, better than you ever 

loved, — 
Love me, I think, as you love life 

itself ! 
JEgisthus ! Speak, ^gisthus ! 

^GISTHUS. 

O great heart, 
I am all yours. Do M'ith me what 
you will. 

CLYTEJINESTKA. 

O, if you love me, I have strength 

for both. 
And you do love me still ? 

^GISTIIUS. 

O more, thrice more, 
Thrice more then wert thou Aphro- 
dite's self 
Stept zonec], and sandalled from the 

Olympian Feasts 
Or first revealed among the pink sea- 
foam. 

CLYTEMXESTRA. 

Whate'er I am, be sure that I am 
that 

Which thou hast made me, — noth- 
ing of myself. 

Once, all unheedful, careless of my- 
self, 

And wholly ignorant of what I was, 

I grew up as a reed some wind will 
touch. 

And wake to prophecy,— tili then ail 
♦mute. 

And void of melody, — a foolish 
weed ! 

My soul was blind, and all my life 
was dark. 

And all my heart pined with some 
ignorant want. 

I moved about, a shadow in the 
house. 

And felt unwedded though I was a 
wife ; 

And all the men and women which 
I saw 



Were but as pictures painted on a 

wall : 
To me they had not either heart, or 

brain, 
Or lips, or language, — pictures! noth- 
ing more. 
Then, suddenly, athwart those 

lonely hours 
Which, day by day dreamed listlessly 

away, 
Led to the dark and melancholy 

tomb. 
Thy presence passed and touched 

me with a soul. 
My life did but begin when I found 

thee. 
O what a strength was hidden in this 

heart ! 
As, all unvalued, in its cold dark 

cave 
Under snow hills, sonie rare and 

priceless gem 
May sparkle and burn, so in this 

life of mine 
Love lay shut up. You broke the 

rock away, 
You lit upon the jewel that it hid. 
You plucked it forth, — to wear it, 

my Beloved ! 
To set in the crown of thy dear life ! 
To embellish fortune ! Cast it not 

away. 
Now call me by the old familiar- 
names : 
Call me again your Queen, as once 

you used ; 
You large-eyed Here ! 

iEGISTHUS. 

O, you are a Queen 
That should have none but Gods to 

rule over ! 
Make me immortal with one costly 

kiss ! 

VIII. CHORUS. ELECTRA. CLY- 
TLMNESTRA. ^GISTHUS. 

CHOllUS. 

lo I lo I I hear the people shout. 



368 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



ELECTRA. 

See liow these two do mutually con- 
fer, 

Hatching new infamy. Now will he 
dare, 

In his unbounded impudence, to 
meet 

My father's eyes ? The hour is nigh 
at hand. 

CLYTEMNESTKA. 

O love, be bold ! the hour is nigh at 
hand. 



Laden with retribution, lingering 
slow. 

.EGisxnus. 

A time in travail with some great 
distress. 

CLYTEMNESTKA. 

Nay, rather safety for the rest of 

time. 
O love ! O hate ! 

ELECTRA. 

O vengeance ! 

^GtlSTHUS. 

O wild chance 
If favoring fate — 

CLYTEMNESTKA. 

Despair is more than fate. 

CHORUS. 

lo ! lo ! The King is on his march. 

^GISTIIUS. 

Did you hear that ? 

ELECTRA. 

The hour is nigh at hand ! 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

Leave me to deal with these. I know 

the arts 
That guide the doubtful purpose of 

discourse 



Through many windings to the ap- 
pointed goal. 

I'll draw them on to such a frame of 
mind 

As best befits our jDurpose. You, 
meanwhile, 

Scatter vague words among the 
otlier crowd, 

Least the event, when it is due, fall 
foul 

Of unpropitious natures. 

^GISTIIUS. 

Do you fear 
The helpless, blind ill-will of such a 
crowd ? 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

He only fears mankind who knows 

them not. 
But him I j)raise not who despises 

them. 
Whence come, Electra ? 



From my father's hearth 
To meet him ; for the hour is nigh 
at hand. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

So do our hopes race hotly to one 

end, 
(A noble rivalry !) as who shall first 
Embrace this happy fortune. Tarry 

not. 
We too will follow. 

ELECTRA. 

Justice, O be swift! 

IX. CLYTEMNESTRA. CHORUS. 
SEMI-CHORUS. HERALD. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

A froward child ! She's gone. My 

blood's in her. 
Her father's, too, looks out of that 

proud face. 
She is too bold . . . ha, well — M^\^- 

thus ? . . . goue 1 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



369 



O fate ! to be a woman ! You great 

Gods, 
Wliy tlitl you fashion me in this soft 

mould ? 
Give me these lengths of silky hair ? 

These hands 
Too delicately dimpled ! and these 

arms 
Too Avhite, too weak ! yet leave the 

man's heart in me, 
To mar your masterpiece, — that I 

sliould perish, 
Who else had won renown among my 

peers, 
A man, with men, — perchance a god 

with you. 
Had you but better sexed me, you 

blind Gods ! 
But, as for man, all things are fitting 

to him. 
He strikes his fellow 'mid the clang- 
ing shields, 
And leaps among the smoking walls, 

and takes 
Some long-haired virgin wailing at 

tlie shrines. 
Her brethren having fallen ; and 

you Gods 
Commend him, crown him, grant 

him ample days, 
And dying honor, and an endless 

peace 
Among the deep Elysian asphodels. 
O fate, to be a woman ! To be led. 
Dumb, like a poor mule, at a mas- 
ter's will, 
And be a slave, though bred in pal- 
aces, 
And be a fool, though seated with 

the wise, — 
A poor and i)itiful fool, as I am 

now. 
Loving and hating my vain life 

away ! 

CHOKUS. 

These flowers — we plucked them 
At morninc;, and took them 
From bright bees that sucked 
them 



And warm winds that shook them 
'Neath blue hills that o'erlook 
them. 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

With the dews of the meadow 
Our rosy warm fingers 
Sparkle yet, and the shadow 
Of the summer-cloud lingers 
In the hair of us singers. 

FIRST SEMI-CHORUS. 

Ere these buds on our altars 
Fade ; ere the forkt fire, 
Fed with pure honey, falters 
And fails : louder, higher 
Raise the Paean. 

SECOND SEMI-CIIORUS. 

Draw nigher, 
Stand closer ! First praise we 
The Father of all. 
To him the song raise we. 
Over Heaven's golden wall 
Let it fall ! Let it fall ! 

FIRST SEMI-CnORUS. 

Then Apollo, the king of 
The lyre and the bow ; 
Who taught us to sing of 
The deeds that we know, — 
Deeds well done long ago. 

SECOND SEMI-CHORUS. 

Next, of all the Immortals, 
Athene's gray eyes ; 
Who sits throned in our portals; 
Ever fair, ever wise. 

FIRST SEMI-CHORUS. 

Neither dare we despise 
To extol the great Here, 

SECOND SEMI-CHORUS. 

And then, 
As is due, sliall our song 
Be of those among men 
Who were brave, who were strong, 
Who endured. 



37° 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



FIKST SEMI-CHOKUS. 

Then, the wrong 
Of tlie Phrygian ; and Ihon's false 

sons : 
And Scamander's wild wave 
Through the bleak plain that runs. 

SECOND SEMI-CHORUS. 

Then, the death of the brave. 

FIRST SEMI-CHORUS. 

Last, of whom the Gods save 
For new honors : of them none 
So good or so great 
As our chief Agamemnon 
The crown of our State. 

CLYTEMNESTKA. 

O friends, true hearts, rejoice with 
me ! This day 

Shall crown the hope of ten uncer- 
tain years ! 

CHORUS. 

For Agamemnon cannot be far off — 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

He comes — and yet — O Heaven pre- 
serve us all ! 

My heart is weak — there's One he 
brings not back ; 

Who went with him ; who will not 
come again ; 

Whom we shall never see ! — 



O Queen, for whom. 
Lamenting thus, is your great heart 
cast down ? 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

The earliest loved — the early lost ! 
my child — 



CHORUS. 



Iphigenia ? 



CLYTEMNESTRA. 

She— my child- 

CHORUS. 

—Alas ! 
That was a terrible necessity ! 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

Was it necessity ? O pardon, friends, 
But in the dark, unsolaced solitude, 
Wild thoughts come to me, and per- 
plex my heart. 
This, which you call a dread neces- 
sity, 
Was it a murder or a sacrifice ? 

CHORUS. 

It was a God that did decree the 
death. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

'Tis through the heart the Gods do 
speak to us. 

High instincts are the oracles of 
heaven. 

Did ever heart, — did ever God, be- 
fore. 

Suggest such foul inf anticidal lie ? 

CHORUS. 

Be comforted ! The imiversal good 
Needed this single, individual loss. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

Can all men's good be helped by one 
man's crime ? 



He loosed the Greeks from Aiilis by 
that deed. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

O casual argument ! Who gave the 
Greeks 

Such bloody claim upon a virgin's 
life ? 

Shall the pure bleed to purge impu- 
rity ? 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



371 



A hundred Helens were not worth 
that death ! 

What ! had the manhood of com- 
bine'd Greece, 

Whose boast was in its untamed 
strength, no help 

Better than the spilt blood of one 
poor girl '? 

Or, if it were of need that blood 
should flow 

What God ordained him execution- 
er ? 

Was it for him the armament was 
planned ? 

For him that angry Greece was 
leagued in war ? 

For him, or Menelaus, was this done? 

Was the cause his, or Menelaus' 
cause ? 

Was he less sire than Menelaus was? 

He, too, had children ; did, he mur- 
der them ? 

O, was it manlike ? was it human, 
even ? 

CHORUS. 

Alas ! alas ! it was an evil thing. 

CLYTEMNESTEA. 

O frieiuls, if any one among you all. 
If any be a mother, bear with me ! 
She was my earliest born, my best 

beloved. 
The painful labor of that perilous 

birth 
That gave her life did almost take 

my own. 
He had no pain. He did not bring 

her forth. 
How should he, therefore, love her 

as I loved ? 

CHOKUS. 

Ai ! ai ! alas ! Our tears run down 
with yours. 

CLYTEMNESTEA. 

O, who shall say with what delicious 

tears, 
With M'hat ineffable tenderness, 

while he 



Took his blithe pastime on the windy 

plain. 
Among the ringing camps, and 

neighing steeds, 
First of his glad compeers, I sat 

apart, 
Silent, within the solitary house : 
Kocking the little child upon my 

breast ; 
And soothed its soft eyes into sleep 

with song ! 



Ai ! ai ! unhappy, sad, unchilded 
one ! 

CLYTEMJTESTRA. 

Or, when I taught, from inarticulate 

sounds, 
The little, lisping lips, to breathe his 

name. 
Now they will never breathe that 

name again ! 

CHORUS. 

Alas ! for Hades has not any hope, 
Since Thracian women lopped the 

tuneful head 
Of Orpheus, and Heracleus is no 

more. 

CLY^TEMNESTEA. 

Or, spread in prayer, the helpless, 

infant hands. 
That they, too, might invoke the 

Gods for him. 
Alas, who now invokes the Gods for 

her? 
Unwedded, hapless, gone to glut the 

womb 
Of dark, untimely Orcus ! 



Ai ! alas ! 



CLYTEMNESTEA. 



I would have died, if that could be, 

for her ! 
When life is half-way set to feeble 

eld, 



372 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



And nic'iiiory more than hope, and 

lo dim eyes 
The gorueous tapestry of existence 

shcnvs 
Mothed, fingered, frayed, and bare, 

'twere not so hard 
To fling away this ravelled skein of 

life. 
Which else, a little later, Fate had 

cut. 
And who would sorrow for the o'er- 

blown rose 
Sharp winter strews about ils own 

bleak thorns ? 
But, cropped before the time, to fall 

so young ! 
And Avilher in the gloomy crown of 

Dis ! 
Naver to look upon the blessed siui — 



Ai ! ai ! alinon ! woe is me, this 

grief 
Strikes pity paralyzed. All words 

are weak ! 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

And I had dreamed such splendid 

dreams for her ! 
"Who would not so for Agamemnon's 

child? 
For we had hoped that she, too, in 

her time 
"Would be the mother of heroic 

men ! 

CHOUUS. 

There rises in my heart an awful 

fear, 
Lest from these evils darker evils 

come ; 
For heaven exacts, for wrong, the 

uttermost tear, 
And death hath language after life 

is dumb ! 

CL YTEMNESTRA. 

It works ! it works ! 

CIIOKUS. 

Look, some one comes this way. 



O Honor of the House of Tantalus ! 
The king's wheels echo in the 
brazen gates. 

CLYTEJINESTRA. 

Our heart is half-way there, to wel- 
come him. 

How looks he? Well? And all 
our long-lost friends — 

Their faces grow before me. Lead 
the way 

Where we uuiy meet them All our 
haste seems slow. 

cnoRUS. 

Would that he brought his dead 
child back with him ! 

CLYTEJINESTRA. 

Now let him come. The mischief 
works apace ! 



X. CHORUS. 



The winds were lulled in Aulis ; 

and the day, 
Down-sloped, was loitering to the 

lazy west. 
There was no motion of the glassy 

bay. 
But all things by a heavy light 

opprest. 
Windless, cut off from the destined 

way, — 
Dark shrouds, distinct against the 

lurid lull,— 
Dark ropes hung useless, loose, from 

mast to hull, — 
The black ships lay abreast. 
Not any cloud would cross the 

brooding skies. 
The distant sea boomed faintly. 

Nollung more. 
They walked about upon the yellow 

shore \ 



CI. YTEMNESTRA. 



373 



Or, lying listless, huddled groups 
supine. 

With faces turned toward the flat 
sea-spine, 

They planned the Phrygian battle 
o'er and o'er ; 

Till each grew sullen, and would 
talk no more. 

But sat, dumb-dreaming. Then 
would some one rise. 

And look toward the hollow hulls, 
with haggard, hopeless eyes — 

Wild eyes — and, crowding romid, 
yet wilder eyes — 

And gaping, languid lips ; 

And everywhere that men could see. 

About the black, black ships, 

AVas nothing but the deep-red sea ; 

The deep-red shore ; 

The deep-red skies ; 

The deep-red silence, thick with 
thirsty sighs ; 

And daylight, dying slowly. Noth- 
ing more. 

The tall masts stood upright ; 

And not a sail above the burnished 
prores ; 

The languid sea, like one outwearied 
quite. 

Shrank, dying inward into hollow 
shores, 

And breathless harbors, under sandy 
bars ; 

And, one by one, down tracts of 
quivering blue. 

The singed and sultry stars 

Looived from the inmost heaven, 
far, faint, and few, 

While, all below, the sick and steam- 
ing brine 

The spilled-out sunset did incarna- 
dine. 

At last one broke the silence ; and a 

word 
Was lisped and buzzed about, from 

mouth to mouth ; 
Pale faces grew more pale ; wild 

whispers stirred ; 
And men, with moody, murmuring 

lips, conferred 



In ominous tones, from shaggy 

beards uncouth : 
As though some wind had broken 

from the blurred 
And blazing prison of the stagnant 

drouth. 
And stirred the salt sea in the stifled 

south. 
The long-robed priests stood round ; 

and, in the gloom, 
Under black brows, their bright and 

greedy eyes, 
Shone dealhfully ; there was a 

sound of sighs. 
Thick-sobbed from choking throats 

among the crowd. 
That, whispering, gathered close, 

with dark heads bowed ; 
But no man lifted up his voice aloud. 
For heavy hung o'er all tlie helpless 

sense of doom. 

Then, after solemn prayer. 

The father bade the attendants, ten- 
derly 

Lift her upon the lurid altar-stone. 

There was no hope in any face ; 
each eye 

Swam tearful, that lier own did gaze 
upon. 

They bound her helpless hands with 
mournful care ; 

And looped up her long hair, 

That hung about her, like an amber 
shower, 

Mixed with the saffron robe, and 
falling lower, 

Down from her bare and cold white 
shoulder flung. 

Upon the heaving breast the pale 
cheek hung, 

Suffused with that wild light that 
rolled among 

The pausing crowd, out of the crim- 
son drouth. 

They held hot hands upon her 
pleading mouth ; 

And stifled on faint lips the natural 
cry. 

Back from the altar-stone, 

Slow-moving in his tixed place 



374 



CLYTEMNESTRA. 



A little space, 

The speechless father turned. No 

word was said, 
He wrapped his mantle close about 

his face, 
In his dumb grief, without a moan. 
The lopping axe was lifted overhead. 
Then, suddenly, 
There soiuided a strange motion of 

the sea. 
Booming far inland ; and above the 

east 
A ragged cloud rose slowly, and in- 
creased. 
Not one line in the horoscope of 

Time 
Is perfect. O, what falling off is 

tliis. 
When some grand soul, that else had 

been sublime, 
Falls luiawares amiss. 
And stoops its crested strength to 

sudden ciime ! 

So gracious a thing is it, and sweet, 
In life's clear centre one true man to 

see. 
That holds strong nature in a wise 

control ; 
Throbbing out, all round, the heat 
Of a large and liberal soul. 
No shadow. sinuJating life, 
But pulses warm with human nature, 
In a soul of godlike stature ; 
Heart and brain, all rich and rife 
With noble instincts ; strong to meet 
Time calmly, in his purposed place. 
ISmmd through and through, and all 

complete ; 
Exalting what is low and base ; 
Enlarging what is narrow and small; 
lie stamps his character on all, 
And with his grand identity 
Fills up Creation's eye. 
He will not dream the aimless years 

away 
In blank delay. 
But makes eternity of to-day. 
And reaps the full-eared time. For 

him 
Nature her aflluent horn doth brim, 



To strew with fruit and flowers his 

way- 
Fruits ripe and flowers gay. 

The clear soul in his earnest eyes 
Looks through and through all 

plaited lies, 
Time shall not rob him of his youth, 
Nor narrow his lai'ge sympathies. 
He is not true, he is a truth, 
And such a truth as never dies. 
Who knows his nature, feels his 

right. 
And, toiling, toils for his delight ; 
Not as slaves toil : where'er he goes, 
The desert blossoms with the rose. 
He trusts himself in scorn of doubt, 
And lets orbed purpose widen out. 
The world works with him ; all men 

see 
Some part of them fulfilled in him ; 
His memory never shall gi-ow dim ; 
He holds the heaven and earth in 

fee. 
Not following that, fulfilling this, 
He is immortal, for he is ! 

O weep ! weep ! weep ! 

Weep for the young that die ; 

As it were pale flowers that wither 

under 
The smiting sun, and fall asimder, 
Bef(jre the dews on the gi-ass are dry, 
Or the tender twilight is out of the 

sky. 
Or the lilies have fallen asleep ; 
Or ships by a wanton wind cut short 
Are wrecked in sight of the placid 

port 
Sinking strangely, and suddenly — 
Sadly, and strangely, and suddenly — 
Into the black Plutonian deep. 
O weep ! weep ! weep ! 
Weep, and bow the head, 
For those whose sun is set at noon ; 
Whose night is dark, without a moon; 
Whose aim of life is sped 
Beyond pursuing woes. 
And the arrow of angry foes, 
To the darkness that no man knows — 
The darkness among the dead. 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



375 



Let lis mourn, and bow the head, 

And lift up the voice, and weep 

For the early dead ! 

For the early dead we may bow the 
head, 

And strike the breast, and weep ; 

But, O, what shall be said 

For the living sorrow ? 

For the living sorrow our grief — 

Dumb grief — draws no relief 

From tears, nor yet may borrow 

Solace from sound or speech ; — 

For the living sorrow 

That heaps to-moirow upon to-mor- 
row 

In piled-up pain, beyond Hope's 
reach ! 

It is well that we mourn for the early 
dead. 

Strike the breast, and bow the head; 

For the sorrow for these may be sung, 
or said. 

And the chaplets be woven for the 
fallen head. 

And the urns to the stately tombs be 
led. 

And Love from their memory may 
be fed, 

And song may ennoble the anguish ; 

But, O, for the living sorrow, — 

For the living sorrow what hopes re- 
main ? 

For the prisoned, pining, passionate 
pain. 

That is doomed forever to languish, 

And to languish forever in vain. 

For the want of the words that may 
bestead 

The hunger that out of loss is bred. 

O friends, for the living sorrow — 

For the living sorrow — 

For the living sorrow what shall be 
said ? 

XI. A PnOCTAN. CHORUS. 
SEMI-CHOEUS. 

PIIOCIAN. 

O noble strangers, if indeed you be 
Such as you seem, of Argos, and the 
land 



That the unconquer'd Agamemnon 

rules, 
Tell me is this the palace, these the 

roofs 
Of the Atridse, famed in ancient 

song ? 

CHORUS. 

N'ot without truth you name the 

neighborhood, 
Standing before the threshold, and 

the doors 
Of Pelops, and upon the Argive soil. 
That whicli you see above the Agora 
Is the old fane of the Lycajan God, 
And this the house of Agamemnon's 

queen. 
But whence art thou ? For if thy 

dusty locks, 
And those soiled sandals show with 

aught of truth, 
Thou shouldst be come from far. 

PHOCIAN. 

And am so, friends, 
But, by Heaven's favor, here my 
joui'ney ends. 

CHORUS. 

Whence, then, thy way ? 



From Phocis ; charged with gifts 
For Agamemnon, and with messages 
From Strophius, and the sister of 

your king. 
Our watchmen saw the beacon on 

the hills. 
And leaned for joy. Say, is the king 

yet come '? 

CHORUS. 

He comes this way ; stand by, I hear 

them shout ; 
Here shall you meet him, as he 

mounts the hill. 



Now blest be all the Gods, from 
Father Zeus, 



Who reigns o'er windy CEta, far 

away, 
To King Apollo, with the golden 

horns. 



Look liow tliey cling about him ! 
Far and near 

The town breaks loose, and follows 
after, 

Crowding up the ringing ways. 

The boy forgets to watch the steer ; 

The grazing steer forgets to graze ; 

The shepherd leaves tlie herd ; 

The priest will leave the fane ; 

The deep heart of the land is stirred 

To sunny tears, and tearful laughter, 

To look into his face again. 

Burst, burst the brazen gates ! 

Throw open the hearths, and follow! 

Let the shouts of the youths go up 
to Apollo, 

Lord of the graceful quiver : 

Till the tingling sky dilates — 

Dilates, and palpitates ; 

And, Pajan Piean ! the virgins 
sing ; 

P?ean ! P^ean ! the king ! the king ! 

Laden with spoils from Phrygia ! 

lo ! lo ! lo I they sing 

Till the pillars of Olympus ring : 

lo ! to Queen Ortygia, 

Whose double torch shall burn for- 
ever ? 

But thou, O Lord of the graceful 
quiver, • 

Bid. bid thy Pythian splendor halt. 

Where'er he beams, sui'passing sight; 

Or on some ocean isthmus bent,- 

Or wheeled from the dark continent. 

Half-way down Heaven's rosy vault. 

Toward the dewy cone of night. 

Let not the breathless air grow dim. 

Until the whole land look at him ! 

SKMI-CUOKUS. 

Stand back ! 

SEMi-cuonus. 
Will he come this way ? 



SEMI-CHORUS. 

No ; by us. 

.SEMi-ciionus. 
Gods, what a crowd ! 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

How firm the old men walk I 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

There goes the king. I know him 
by his beard. 

SEMI-CHORUS, 

And I, too, by the manner of his 

gait. 
That Godlike spirit lifts him from 

the earth. 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

How gray he looks ! 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

His cheek is seamed with scars. 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

What a bull's front ! 

SiiMI-CHORUS. 

He stands up like a tower. 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

Ay, like some moving tower of 
arme'd men. 

That carries conquest under city- 
walls. 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

He lifts his sublime head, and in his 

port 
Bears eminent authority. 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

Behold, 
His spear shows like the spindle of a 
Fate ! 



CT YTEMNESTRA. 



377 



T 



SEMI-CHORUS. 

O, what an arm ! 

SEMI-CHOnUS. 

Most fit for such a SM'ord ; 
Look at that sword. 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

What shoulders ! 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

What a throat ! 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

What are these bearing ? 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

Urns. 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

Alas ! alas ! 

• SEMI-CHORUS. 

O friends, look here ! how are the 

mighty men 
Shrunk up into a little vase of earth, 
A child might lift. Sheathed each 

in brazen plates, 
They went so heavy, they come 

back so light, 
Sheathed, each one, in the brazen 

urn of death ! 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

With what a stateliness he moves 
along ! 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

See, how they touch his skirt, and 
grasp his harul ! 

SEMI-CHORUS, 

Is that the queen ? 



SEMI-CHORUS. 

Ay, how siie matches him , 
With what grand eyes she looks up! 
full in his ! 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

Say, what are these ! 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

O Phrygians ! how they walk! 
The only sad man in ihe crowd, I 
think. 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

But who is this, that with such 

scornful brows. 
And looks averted, walks among the 

rest ? 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

I know not, but some Phrygian wo- 
man, sure. 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

Her heavy-fallen hair down her 

white neck 
(A dying sunbeam tangled in each 

tress) 
All its neglected beauty pours one 

way. 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

Her looks bend ever on the alien 

ground, 
As though the stones of Troy were 

in her path. 
And in the paine'd paleness of her 

brow 
Sorrow hath made a regal tenement. 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

Here comes Electra ; young Orestes, 

too ; 
See how he emulates his father's 

stride ! 



378 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



SEMI-CHORUS. 

Look at ^gisthus, where lie walks 

apart, 
And bites his lip. 

SEMI-CHOEUS. 

I oft have seen him so 
When something cliafes him in his 
bitter moods. 

SEMI-CHOBUS. 

Peace, here they come ! 

CHORUS. 

lo ! lo ! The King ! 



XII. agamemno:n', clytem- 

NESTRA, ^GISTHUS, ELEC- 
TRA, ORESTES, CASSANDRA, 

a Phocian, Chorus, Semi-Chorus, 
and others in the procession. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

O blazing snn, that in thy skyey 
tower, 

Pausest to see one kingly as thy- 
self, 

Lend all thy brighest beams to light 
his head. 

And guide our gladness ! Friends, 
behold the King ! 

■ Nor hath iEtolian Jove, the arbiter 
Of conquests, well disposed the issues 

here ; 
For every night that brought not 

news f I oiu Troy 
Heaped fear on fear, as waves suc- 
i ceed to waves, 

I When Northern blasts blon^ white 
i the Cretan main, — 

; Knowing that tliou, far off, from 

toll to toil 
I Climbedst, uncertain. Unto such an 
] one 

■ His children, and young offspring 
: of the house 

i 



Are as a field, which he, the hus- 
bandman. 
Owning far off does only look upon 
At seedtime once, nor then till 

harvest comes ; 
And his sad wife must wet with 

nightly tears 
Unsolaced pillows, fearing for his 

fate. 
To these how welcome, then, his glad 

return, 
When he, as thou, comes heavy with 

the weiglit 
Of great achievements, and the spoils 

of time. 

AGAMEMNON. 

Enough ! enough ! we weigh you at 

full worth. 
And hold you dear, whose gladness 

equals yours ; 
But women ever err by over-talk. 
Silence to women, as the beard to 

men. 
Brings honor ; and plain truth is 

hurt, not helped 
By many words. To each his 

separate sphere 
The Gods allot. To me the sound- 
ing camp, 
Steeds, and the oaken spear ; to you 

the hearth. 
Children, and household duties of 

the loom. 
'Tis man's to win an honorable 

name ; 
Woman's to keep it honorable still. 

CL YTEMNESTRA. 

(O beast ! O weakness of this wo- 
manhood ! 

To let these pompous male things 
strut in our eyes. 

And in tlielr lordship lap themselves 
secure. 

Because the lots in life are fallen to 
them. 

Am I less heart and head, less blood 
and brain. 

Less force and feeling, pulse and 
passion — I — 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



379 



Than this self-worshipper — a lie all 

through ?) 
Forgive if joy too long unloose our 

lips, 
Silent so long : your words fall on 

ray soul 
As rain on thirsty lauds, that feeds 

the dearth 
With blessed nourishment. My 

whole heart hears. 
You speaking thus, I would be 

silent ever. 

AGAMEMNON. 

Who is this man ? 

CL YTEMNESTRA. 

A Phocian, by his look. 



O King, from Strophius, and your 

sister's court. 
Despatched with this sealed tablet, 

and with gifts, 
Though both express, so says my 

royal Head, 
But poorly the rich welcome they 

intend. 
Will you see this ? — and these ? 

AGAMEMNON. 

Anon ! anon ! 
We'll look at them within. O child, 

thine eyes 
Look wanner welcome than all words 

express. 
Thou art mine own child by that 

royal brow. 
Nature hath marked thee mine. 



ELECTRA. 



O Father ! 



AGAMEMNON. 

Come ! 
And our Orestes ! He is nobly 

grown ; 
He shall do great deeds when our 

own are dim. 
So shall men come to say "the 

father's sword 



In the son's hands hath hewn out 

nobler fame." 
Think of it, little one ! where is our 

cousin ? 

^GISTHUS. 

Here ! And the keys of the 
Acropolis ? 

AGAMEMNON. 

well ! this dust and heat are over- 

much. 
And, cousin, you look pale. Anon ! 

anon ! 
Speak to us by and by. Let business 

wait. 
Is our house ordered ? we will take 

the bath. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

Will you within ? where all is ordered 
fair 

Befitting state : cool chambers, 
marble-floored 

Or piled with blazing carpets, scented 
rare 

With the sweet spirit of each odor- 
ous gum 

In dim, delicious, amorous mists 
about 

The purple-paven, silver-sided bath, 

Deep, flashing, pure. 

AGAMEMNON. 

Look to our captives then. 

1 charge you chiefly with this woman 

here, 
Cassandra, the mad prophetess of 

Troy. 
See that you chafe her not in her 

wild moods. 



XIII. CLYTEMNESTKA. ^GIS- 
THUS. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

Linger not ! 

^GISTHTTS. 

What ? you will to-day — 



38o 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



CLYTEMNESTRA. 

— This hour. 

^GISTHUS. 

O, if some chance mar all ! 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

Well make chance sure. 
Doubt is tlie doomsman of self-judged 

disgrace : 
But every chance brings safety to 

self-help. 

^Gisxnus, 
Ay, but the means — the time — 

CLYTEJIXESTRA, 

— Fulfil themselves. 
O most irresolute heart ! is this a 

time 
When tlirough the awful pause of 

life, distinct, 
The sounding shears of Fate slope 

near, to stand 
Meek, like tame wethers, and be 

shorn ? How say you. 
The blithe wind up, and the broad 

sea before liini. 
Who would croucli all day long be- 
side the mast 
Counting the surges beat his idle 

helm. 
Because between him and the golden 

isles 
The shadow of a passing storm might 

hang ? 
Danger, being pregnant, doth beget 

resolve. 



^GISTHUS. 

Thou wert not born to fail, 
me thy hand. 



Give 



CLYTEMNESTRA. 



Take it. 



^GISTIIUS. 

It does not tremble. 



CLYTEMNESTRA. 

O be strong I 
The future hangs upon the die we 

cast : 
Fortune plays high for us — 

^GISTHUS. 

Gods grant she win. 



XIV. CHORUS. SEMI-CHOEUS 
CASSANDRA. 

CHORUS. 

O thou that dost Avith globed glory 
Sweep the dark world at noon of 

night, 
Or among snowy summits, wild and 

hoary, 
Or through the mighty silences 
Of innnemorial seas. 
With all the stars behind thee flying 

white, 
O take with thee, where'er 
Thou wanderest, ancient Care, 
And hide her in some interlunar 

haunt ; 
Where but the wild bird's chaunt 
At night, through rocky ridges gaunt. 
Or meanings of some homeless sea 

may find her 
There, Goddess, bar, and bind her ; 
Where she may pine, but wander not; 
Loathe her haunts, but leave them 

not ; 
Wail and rave to the wind and wave 
That hear, yet understand her not ; 
And curse lier chains, yet cleave 

them not ; 
And hate her lot, yet help it not. 
Or let her rove with Gods undone 
Who dwell l)elow the setting sun, 
And the sad western hours 
That burn in fiery bowers ; 
Or in Aniphitrite's grot 
Whore the vexc'd tides unite, 
And the spent wind, howling, breaks 
O'er sullen oceans out of sight 
Among sea-snakes, that the white 

moon wakes 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



381 



Till they shake themselves into 

diamond flakes, 
Coil and twine in the glittering hrine 
And swing tliemselves in the long 

uioonsliine ; 
Or by wild shores lioarsely rage, 
And moan, and vent her spite, 
In some inhosi^itable harborage 
Of Tln-acian waters, white. 
There let lier grieve, and grieve, and 

holil lier breath. 
Until slie hate herself to death. 
I seem witli raptnre lifted higher. 
Like one in mystic trance. 
O Pan ! Pan ! Pan ! 
First friend of man, 
And founder of Heaven's choir. 
Come thou from old Cyllene, and in- 
spire 
The Giiossian, and Nysajan dance ! 
Come th(ju, too, Delian king. 
From the blue JEgean sea. 
And Mycoue's yellow coast : 
Give my spirit such a wing 
As there the foolish Icarus lost, 
That she may soar above the cope 
Of this high pinnacle of gladness, 
And dizzy height of hope ; 
And there, beyond all reach of sad- 
ness, 
May tune my lips to sing 
Great Pieans, full and free, 
Till the wliole world ring 
With such heart-melting madness 
As bards are taught by thee ! 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

Look to the sad Cassandra, how she 
stands ! 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

She turns not from the wringing of 
her hands. 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

What is she doing ? 

SEMI-CHORUSo 

Look, her lips are moved. 



SEMI-CHORUS. 

And yet their motion shapes not any 
sound. 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

Speak to her. 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

She will heed not. 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

But yet speak. 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

Unhappy woman, cease a little while 
From mourning. Kecognize the 

work of Heaven. 
Troy smoulders. Think not of it. 

Let the past 
B3 buried in the past. Tears mend 

it not. 
Fate may be kindlier yet than she 

appears. 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

She does not answer. 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

Call to her again. 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

O break this scornful silence! Hear 

ns speak. 
We would console you. 

SEJII-CHORUS. 

Look, how she is moved ! 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

O speak ! the heart's hurt oft is 
helped by words. 

CASSANDRA. 

O Itys ! Itys ! Itys 1 

SEMI-CIIORUS. 

What a shriek ! 
She takes the language of the night- 
ingale. 



382 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



Unhappy bird ! that mourns her 

perished form, 
And leans her breast against a thorn, 

all night. 

CASSANDRA. 

The bull is in the shambles. 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

Listen, friends ! 
She mutters something to herself. 

CASSANDRA. 

Alas! 
Did any name Apollo ? woe is me ! 

SEMI- CHORUS. 

She calls upon the God. 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

Unhappy one. 
What sorrow strikes thee with be- 
wilderment ? 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

Now she is mute again. 



A Stygian cold 
Creeps through my limbs, and 

loosens every joint. 
The hot blood freezes in its arteries, 
And stagnates round the region of 

the heart. 
A cloud comes up from sooty Ache- 
ron, 
And clothes mine eyelids 
With infernal night. 
My hair stands up. 
What supernatural awe 
Shoots, shrivelling through me, 
To the marrow and bone ? 
O dread and wise Prophetic Powers, 
Whose strong-compelling law 
Doth hold in awe 
The laboring hours. 
Your intervention I invoke, 



My soul from this wild doubt to 

save ; 
Whether you have 
Your dwelling in some dark, oracu- 
lar cave, 
Or solemn, sacred oak ; 
Or in Dodona's ancient, honored 

beech. 
Whose mystic boughs above 
Sat the wise dove ; 
Or if the tuneful voice of old 
Awake in Delos, to unfold 
Dark wisdom in ambiguous speech. 
Upon the verge of strange despair 
My heart grows dizzy. Now I seem 
Like one that dreams some ghastly 

dream. 
And cannot cast away his care, 
But harrows all the haggard air 
AVith his hard breath. Above, be- 
neath. 
The empty silence seems to team 
With apprehension. O declare 
What hidden thing doth Fate pre- 
pare, 
What hidden, horrible thing doth 

Fate prepare ? 
For of some hidden grief my heart 
seems half aware. 



XV. CLYTEMNESTRA. CAS- 
SANDRA. CHORUS. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

One blow makes all sure. Ay, but 

then, — beyond ? 
I cannot trammel \v^ the future 

thus, 
And so forecast the time, as with 

one blow 
To break the hundred Hydra-heads 

of Chance. 
Beyond — beyond I dare not look, for 

who, 
If first he scanned the space, would 

leap the gidf ? 
One blow secures the moment. O, 

but he . . 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



383 



Ay, there it lies ! I dread lest my 

love, being 
So much the stronger, scare his own 

to death ; 
As what they comprehended not, 

men abhor. 
He has a wavering nature, easily 
Unpoised ; and trembling ever on 

extremes. 
O, what if terror outweigh love, and 

love, 
Having defiled his countenance, take 

part 
Against himself, self-loathed, a 

fallen God ? 
Ah, his was never yet the loving 

soul, 
But rather that which lets itself be 

loved ; 
As some loose lily leans upon a 

lake. 
Letting the lymph reflect it, as it 

will. 
Still idly swayed, whichever way the 

stream 
Stirs the green tangles of the water 

moss. 
The flower of his love never bloomed 

upright. 
But a sweet parasite, that loved to 

lean 
On stronger natures, winning 

slrength from them, — 
Not such a flower as whose delirious 

cup 
Maddens the bee, and never can give 

forth 
Enough of fragrance, yet is ever 

sweet. 
Yet which is sweetest, — to receive or 

give ? 
Sweet to receive, and sweet to give, 

in love ! 
When one is never sated that re- 
ceives, 
Nor ever ail exhausted one that 

gives. 
I think I love him more, that I re- 
semble 
So little aught that pleases me in 

him. 



Perchance, if I dared question this 

dark heart, 
'Tis not for him, but for myself in 

him, 
For that which is my softer self in 

him, — 
I have done this, and this, — and 

shall do more : 
Hoped, wept, dared wildly, and will 

overcome ! 
Does he not need me ? It is sweet 

to think 
That I am all to him, what e'er I be 
To others ; and to one, — little, I 

know ! 
But to him, all things, — sceptre, 

sword, and crown. 
For who would live, but to be loved 

by some one ? 
Be fail', but to give beauty to an- 
other ? 
Or wise, but to instruct some sweet 

desire ? 
Or strong, but that thereby love may 

rejoice ! 
Or who for crime's sake would be 

criminal ? 
And yet for love's sake would not 

dare wild deeds ? 
A mutual necessity, one fear, 
One hope, and the strange iDosture of 

the time 
Unite us now ; — but this need over- 
past, 
O, if, 'twixt his embrace and mine, 

there rise 
The reflex of a murdered head ! and 

he, 
Rememljering the crime, remember 

not 
It was for him that I am criminal. 
But rather hate me for the part he 

took — 
Against his soul, as he will say — in 

this ?— 
I will not think it. Upon this wild 

venture. 
Freighted with love's last wealthiest 

merchandise, 
My heart sets forth. To-morrow I 

shall wake 



3^4 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



A beggar, as it may be, or thrice 

rlcli. 
As one who plucks his last gem from 

his crown 
(Some peai'l for which, in youth, he 

bartered states) 
And, sacrificing with an anxious 

heart. 
Toward niglit puts seaward in a little 

bark 
For lands reported far beyond the 

sun. 
Trusting to win back kingdoms, or 

there drown — 
So I — and with like perilous en- 
deavor ! 
O, but I think I could implore the 

Gods 
More fervently than ever, in my 

youth, 
I prayed that help of Heaven I 

needed not, 
And lifted innocent hands to their 

great sky. 
So much to loose ... so much to 

gain ... so much . , . 
I dare not think how . . . 

Ha, the Phrygian slave ! 
He dares to bring his mistress to the 

hearth ! 
She looks unhappy. I will speak to 

lier. 
Perchance her hatred may approve 

my own, 
And help me in the work I am 

about. 
'Twere well to sound her. 

Be not so cast down, 
Unhappy stranger! Fear no jealous 

hand. 
In sorrow I, too, am not all untried. 
Oui fortunes are not so dissimilar, 
Slaves both — and of one master. 

Nay, approach. 
Is my voice harsh in its appeal to 

thee ? 
If so, believe me, it belies my lieart. 
A woman speaks to thee. 

What, silent still ? 
O, look not on me with such sullen 

eyes, 



Tliere is no accusation in my own. 
Eather on him that brought thee, 

than on thee. 
Our scorn is settled. I would help 

thee. Come ! 
Mute still ? 

I know that shame is ever dumb. 
And ever weak ; but here is no re- 

proacli. 
Listen ! Thy fate is given to thy 

hands. 
Art tliou a woman, and dost scorn 

contempt ? 
Art thou a captive, and dost loathe 

these bonds ? 
Art thou courageous, as men call 

thy race ? 
Or, helpless art thou, and wouldst 

overcome ? 
If so, — look up ! For there is hope 

for thee. 
Give me thy hand — 

CASSANDRA. 

Pall I there is blood on it ! 

CLYTEMXESTRA. 

What is she raving of ? 



Is evil. 



CASSANDRA. 

The place, from old, 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

Ay, there is a sickness, here, 
That needs the knife. 

CASSANDRA. 

O, horrible ! blood ! blood ! 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

I see you are a Phrygian to the 
bone ! 

Coward and slave ! be so forever- 
more ! 

CASSANDRA. 

Apollo! O Apollo ! O blood ! blood! 
The whole place swims with it ! 
The slippery steps 



CL ytemnestra. 



Z^S 



Steam with the fumes ! The rank 
air smells of blood ! 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

Heed her not ! for she knows not 

what she says. 
This is some falling sickness of the 

soul. 
Her fever frights itself. 

CASSAXDRA. 

It reeks ! it reeks ! 
It smokes ! it stifles ! blood ! blood, 
everywhere ! 

CLYTEiAINESTRA. 

See, he hath brought this mad 

woman from Troy, 
To shame our honor, and insult our 

care. 
Look to her, friends, my hands have 

other work ! 



Alas ! the House of Tantalus is 
doomed ! 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

The King sleeps — like an infant. 

Ills liuge strength 
Holds slumber thrice as close as 

other men. 
How well he sleeps ! Make garlands 

for the Gods. 
I go to watch the couch. Cull every 

flower, 
And honor all the tutelary fanes 
With sacrifice as ample as our joy, 
Lest some one say we reverence not 

the Gods ! 



O doome'd House and race ! 

O toilsome, toilsome horsemanship 

Of Pelops ; that ill omen brought 

to us ! 
For since the drowned Myrtilus 
Did from his golden chariot slip 



To his last sleep, below the deep, 
Nothing of sad calamitous disgrace 
Hath angry Heaven ceased to heap 
On this unhappy House of Tan- 
talus. 
Not only upon sacred leaves of old, 
Preserved in many a guarded, mys- 
tic fold, 
But sometimes, too, enrolled 
On tablets fair 
Of stone or l)rass, with quaint and 

curious care, 
In charactei's of gold, 
And many an iron-bound, melan- 
choly book, 
The wisdom of the wise is writ ; 
And hardly shall a man, 
For all he can. 
By painful, slow degrees, 
And nightly reveries. 
Of long, laborious thought, grow 

learned in these. 
But who, that reads a woman's wily 

look. 
Shall say what evil hides, and lurks 

in it? 
Or fathom her false wit ? 
For by a woman fell the man 
Who did Nemasfl's pest destroy, 
And the brinded Hydra slew. 
And many other wonders wrought. 
By a woman, fated Troy 
Was overset, and fell to naught. 
Rnyal Aniphiaraus, too. 
All his wisdom could not free 
From his false Eriphyle, 
Whom a golden necklace bought, — 
So has it been, and so shall it be. 
Ever since the world began ! 

O woman, woman, of what other 

earth 
Hath dtcdal Natui'e moulded thee ? 
Thou art not of our clay compact. 
Not of our common clay ; — 
But when the painful world in labor 

lay — 
liabor long — and agony, 
In her heaving throes distract, 
And vext with angry Heaven's red 

ire, 



386 



CL VTEMNESTRA. 



Nature, kneading snow and fire, 
In thy mystic being pent 
Each contrary element. 
Life and deatli within tliee blent : 
All despair and all desire : 
There to mingle and ferment. 
While, mad midwives, at thy birth, 
Furies mixt with Sirens bent, 
luter-vvreathing snakes and smiles, — 
Fairest dreams and falsest guiles. 

Such a splendid mischief thou ! 
With thy light of languid eyes ; 
And thy bosom of pure snow : 
And thine heart of fire below, 
Whose red light doth come and go 
Ever o'er thy changeful cheek 
When love-whispers tremble weak : 
The warm lips and pensive sighs, 
That the breathless spirit bow : 
And the heavenward life that lies 
In the still serenities 
Of thy snowy, airy brow, — 
ThiTie ethereal airy brow. 
Such a splendid mischief, thou ! 
What are all thy witcheries ? 
All thine evil beauty ? All 
Thy soft looks, and subtle smiles ? 

} Tangled tresses ? Mad caresses ? 

j Tenderness ? Tears and kisses ? 
And the long look, between whiles. 
That the helpless heart beguiles. 
Tranced in such a subtle thrall ? 
What are all thy sighs and smiles ? 
Fairest dreams and falsest guiles ! 
Hoofs to horses, teeth to lions, 
Horns to bulls, and speed to hares, 
To the fish to glide though waters, 
To the bird to glide through airs. 
Nature gave : to men gave courage. 
And the use of brazen spears. 
What was left to give to woman, 
All her gifts thus given ? Ah, 

tears. 
Smiles, and kisses, whispers, 

glances, 
Only these ; and merely beauty 
On her archc'd brows unfurled. 
And with these she shatters lances, 
All unarmed binds arme'd Duty, 
And in triumph drags the world 1 



XVI. SEMI-CHORUS. CHORUS. 
CASSANDRA. AGAMEMNON. 
CLYTEMNESTRA. ^GIS 

THUS. 

SEMI-CHOKUS. 

Break off, break off ! It seems I 
heard a cry. 

CHORUS. 

Surely one called within the house. 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

Stand by. 

CHORUS. 

The Prophetess is troubled. Look, 

her eye 
Rolls fearfully. 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

Now all is husht once more. 

CHORUS. 

I hear the feet of some one at the 
(^oor. 

AGAMEMNON (untJlin). 

Murderess ! oh, oh ! 

SEMI-CHORUS, 

The house is filled with shrieks. 



The sound deceives or that was the 
King's voice. 

SEMI-CHORUS, 

The voice of Agamemnon ! 

AGAMEMNON (loUIlin). 

Ai ! ai ! ai 1 

CASSANDRA. 

The bull is in the toils. 

AGAMEMNON {ivUMn). 

I will not die! 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



387 



^GiSTHUS (ivWdn). 


CHOBUS 


Zeus ! ht} will escajie. 


To the Agora i 


CLYTEMNESTBA (loitMn). 


SEMI-CHORUS. 


He haa it. 


To the temples I 


AGAMEMNON (wUMn). 


CHORUS. 


Ai ! ai ! 

CHORUS. 

Some hideous detvl is being done 

within. 
Burst ill the doors t 


Haste ! haste ! 

AGAMEMNON (wWlin). 

stabbed, oh ! 

CHORUS. 


SEJII-CHORCJS. 


Too late ! 


I cannot open them. 
Barred, barred within ! 


CASSANDRA. 

The bull is bellowing. 


CASSANDRA. 

The axe is at the bull. 


.^GiSTHUS {within). 
Thrust therci again. 


CHORUS. 

Call the elders. 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

And the People. (* Argives ! Ar- 

gives ! 
Alinon ! Alinon ! 


CLYTEMNESTRA (within). 

One blow has done it all. 

^GiSTHUS (within). 
Is it ([uitti through ? 

CLYTEMNESTRA (tvithiu). 


CHORUS. 

You to the Agora. 


He will not move again. 

SEMl-CHORUS. 


SEMI-CHORUS. 

To the temples we. 

CHORUS. 

Hearken, O maidens ! 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

This way. 

CHORUS. 

That way. 

SEMI-CHORUS, 

Ouinlv 1 miink 1 


Heaven and Earth ! My heart 

stands still witli awe ! 
Where will this murder end '.* 

CHORUS. 

Hold ! soma one comes | 


XVII. ELECTRA. OHESTES. 
CHORUS. APHOCIAN-. 

ELECTRA (leading orestes). 
Save us i save him — Orestes I 



CASSANDRA. 

Seal my sight. O Apollo I O Apollo » 



CHORUS. 

What has fallen ? 



388 



CLVTEMJVESTRA. 



ELECTRA. 

An evil thing. O, we are fatherless ! 

CHORUS. 

Ill-starred Electra ! But how fell 
this chance ? 

ELECTRA. 

Hero is no time for words, — scarcoi 

time for flight. 
When from his royal bath tlm Kinj; 

would rise, — 
Tliat devilish woman, lying long in 

lurlv, 
Behind him crept, with stealthy feet 

unheard. 
And flung o'er all his limbs a subtle 

web. 
Caught in the craft of whoso con- 
trived folds, 
Stumbling, Ik; fell, ^gisthus seized 

a sword : 
But halted, half irresolute to strike. 
My father, lil^u a liou in the toils, 
Upheaved his head, and, writhing, 

roared with wrath, 
And angry shame at this infernal 

snare. 
Almost he rent the blinding nets 

atwain. 
But Clytemnestra on him flung her- 
self, 
And caught the steel, and smit him 

through the ribs. 
H i slipped, and reeled. She drove 

Vlm weapon through, 
Piercing the heart ! 

CHORUS. 

O woe ! what tale i:i this ? 

ET.ECTRA. 

I, too, with him, had died, but fo; 

till 5 child, 
And tha'. high vengeanca which is 
yet to be. 

CHORUS. 

Alas ! then Agamemnon i3 no more, 
Who stood, but now, amongst us, 
full of life, 



Crowned with achieving years ! The 

roof and cope 
Of honor, fallen ! Where shall wc 

lift our eyes ? 
Where set renown ? Where garnei- 

up our iiopes ? 
All worth is dying out. Tiio land i:i 

dark, 
And Treason looks abroad in the 

eclipse. 
He did not die the death of men that 

live 
Such life as he lived, fall'n among 

his peers. 
Whom the red battle rolled away, 

while yet 
The shout of Gods was ringing 

through and through them ; 
But Death that feared to front hina 

in full field, 
Lm-ked by the hearth and smote him 

from behind. 
A mighty man is gone. A mightj 

grief 
Remains. And rumor of undying 

deeds 
For song and legend, to the end oi 

time ! 
What tower is strong ? 



O friends — if friends you be — 
For who shall say where falsehood 

festers not, 
Those being falsest, who should 

most be true ? 
Where is that Phociau '? Let him 

take the boy. 
And bear him with him to hia 

master's court. 
Else will ^gisthus slay hira. 

CHORUS. 

Orphaned one, 
Fear you not ? 

ORESTES. 

I am Agamemnon's son* 

CHORUS. 

Therefore shouldst fear — 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



389 ; 



OKESTES. 

And therefore cannot fear. 

PHOCIAN. 

I heard a cry. Did any call ? 

CHOEUS. 

O, well ! 
Toil happen this way in the need of 
time. 

ELECTBA. 

O loyal stranger, Agamemnon's child 
Is fatherless. This boy appeals to 

you. 
O save him, save him from his 

father's foes ! 

PHOCIAN. 

Unhappy lady, what wild words are 
these ? 

ELECTRA. 

The house runs blood, ^gisthus, 

liko a fiend. 
Is raging loose, his weapon dripping 
gore. 

CHORUS. 

The king is dead. 

PHOCIAN. 

Is dead ! 

ELECTRA. 

Dead. 

PHOCIAISr. 

\i(> I dream ? 

ELECTRA. 

Such dreams are dreamed in hell — 

such dreams — O no ! 
Is not the earth as solid — heaven 

above — 
Tho sun in heaven — and Natur;» at 

her work — 
And men at theirs — \\w samo. ? O, 

no 1 no dream i 
We shal? not; wake — nor hu ; though 

the God \ sleep ! 
Uimaturally murdered — 



PHOCIAN. 

Mui'dered ! 

ELECTRA. 

Ay. 
And the sun blackens not ; the world 

is green ; 
The fires of the red west are not put 

out. 
Is not the cricket singing in tho 

grass ? 
And the sliy lizard shooting through 

thi3 leaves ? 
I hear the ox low in the labored 

field. 
Those swallows build, and are as 

garrulous 
High up i' the towers. Yet I speak 

the truth, 
By Heaven, I speak the truth — 

PHOCIAlSr. 

Yet more, vouchsafe 
How died the king ? 

ELECTRA. 

O, there shall be a time 
For words hereafter. While we dally 

here, 
Fate haunts, and hounds us. Friend, 

receive this boy. 
Bear him to Strophius. All this 

tragedy 
Eelato as best you may ; it beggars 

speech. 
Tell him a tower of hope is fallen 

this day — 
A name in Greece — 

PHOCIAN. 

— But you — 

ELECTRA. 

Away ! away I 
Destruction posts apace, while we 
delay. 

PHOCIAN. 

Come then I 

ELECTRA. 

I dare not leave m^ laLaw a hearth. 



39° 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



For who would then do honor to his 

urn ? 
It may be that my womanhood and 

yoiith 
May help me here. It may be I shall 

fall, 
And mix my own with Agamemnon's 

blood. 
No matter. On Orestes hangs the 

hope 
Of all this House. Him save for 

better days, 
And ripened vengeance. 

PHOCIAN. 

Noble-hearted one ! 
Come then, last offspring of this 

fated race. 
The future calls thee ! 

OEESTES. 

Sister ! Sister ! 



O Sister ! 



ELECTRA. 
ORESTES. 

ELECTRA. 



Go! 



O my brother ! . . . One last kiss, — 
One last long kiss, — how I have loved 

thee, boy ! 
Was it for this I nourished thy young 

years 
With stately tales, and legends of the 

gods ? 
For this ? . . . How the past crowds 

upon me ! Ah — 
Wilt thou recall, in lonely, lonely 

hours, 
How once we sat together on still 

eves, 
(All me !) and brooded on all serious 

themes 
Of sweet, and high, and beautiful, 

and good, 
That throng the ancient years. 

Alcmena's son. 
And how his life went out in fire on 

(Eta ; 
Or of that bright-haired wanderer 

after fame, 



That brought the great gold-fleece 

across the sea. 
And left a name in Colchis ; or we 

spake 
Of the wise Theseus, councils, king- 
doms, thrones, 
And laws in distant lands ; or, later 

still. 
Of the great leaguer set round Ilion, 
And what heart-stirring tidings of 

the war 
Bards brought to Hellas. But when 

I would breathe 
Thy father's name, didst thou not 

grasp my hand. 
And glorious deeds shone roimd us 

like the stars 
That lit the dark world from a great 

way off. 
And died up into heaven, among the 

Gods y 

ORESTES. 

Sister, O Sister ! 

ELECTRA. 

Ah, too long we linger. 
Away ! away ! 

PHOCIAN. 

Come ! 

CHORUS. 

Heaven go with thee ! 
To Crissa points the hand of Destiny. 

ELECTRA. 

O boy, on thee Fate hangs an awful 

weight 
Of retribution ! Let thy father's 

ghost 
Forever whisper in thine ear. Be 

strong. 
About thee, yet unborn, thy mother 

wove 
The mystic web of life in such-like 

form 
That Agamemnon's spirit in thine 

eyes 
Seems living yet. His seal is set on 

thee ; 



CL YTEMNESlliA. 



391 



And Pelops' ivory shoulder marks 
thee his. 

Thee, child, nor contests on the 
Istlinilan plain, 

Nor sacred apple, nor green laurel- 
leaf. 

But graver deeds await. Forget not, 
son. 

Whose blood, unwashed, defiles thy 
mother's doors ! 

CHORUS. 

O haste ! I hear a sound within the 
house. 

ELECTRA. 

Farewell, then, son of Agamemnon! 

PHOCIAN. 

Come ! 

XVIII. ELECTRA. CHORUS. 
^GISTHUS. 

ELECTRA. 

Gone ! gone ! Ah saved ! . . . O 
fool, thou missest, here ! 

CHORUS. 

Alas, Electra, whither wilt thou go ? 

ELECTRA. 

Touch me not ! Come not near me ! 

Let me be ! 
For this day, which I hoped for, is 

not mine. 

CHORUS. 

See how she gathers round her all 

her robe, [it be 

And sils apart with grief. O, can 

Great Agamemnon is among the 

shades ? 

ELECTRA. 

Would I had grasped his skirt, and 
followed him ! 

CHORUS. 

Alas ! there is an eminence of joy, 
Where Fate grows dizzy, being 

mounted there. 
And so tilts over on the other side ! 



O fallen, O fallen 

The tower, which stood so high ! 

Whose base and girth were strong 

i' the earth. 
Whose head was in the sky ! 
O fall'n that lower of noble power, 
That filled up every eye ! 

He stood so sure, that noble tower ! 
To make secvu-e, and fill with power. 
From length to length, the land of 

Greece ! 
In whose strong bulwarks all men 

saw, 
Garnered on the lap of law, 
For dearth or danger, spears of war, 
And harve: t sheaves of peace ! 
O fail"n, O fall'n that lofty tower,— 
The loftiest tower in Greece K 

His brows he lift above the noon, 
Filled with the day, a noble tower I 
Who took the sunshine and the 

shower. 
And flung them back in merry scorn. 
Who now shall stand when tempests 

lower? 
He was the first to catch the morn, 
The last to see the moon. 
O friends, he was a noble tower ! 
O friends, and fall'n so soon ! 

Ah, well ! lament ! lament ! 

His walls are rent, his bulwarks 

bent. 
And stooped that crested eminence. 
Which stood so high for our de- 
fence ! 
For our defence, — to guard, and 

fence 
From all alarm of hurt and harm, 
The fulness of a land's content ! 
O fall'n away, fall'n at midday, 
And set before tlie sun is down. 
The highest height of our renown I 
O overthrown, the ivory throne ! 
The spoils of war, the golden crown. 
And chief.est honor of the state ! 
O mourn with me ! what tower is 

ft-ee 
From over-topping destiny ? 
What strength is strong to fate ? 



392 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



mourn with me I wlien shall we 

see 
Another such, so good, so great? 
Anotlier such, to guard the state '? 

^EGISTIIUS. 

He sliould have stayed to shout 

thiough Troy, or bellow 
With bulls in Ida— 

CHORUS. 

Look ! iEgisthus comes ! 

Like some lean tiger, having dipt in 
blood 

His dripi^ing fangs, and hot athirst 
tor more. 

His lurid eyeball rolls, as thoiigh it 
swam 

Through sanguine films. He stag- 
gers, drunk with rage 

And crazy mischief. 

^GISTIIUS. 

Hold ! let no one stir ! 

1 charge you, all of you, wlio hear 

me speak. 
Where may the boy Orestes lie con- 
cealed ? 



.EGISTHUS. 

You shall not trifle with me, by my 

beard ! 
There's peril in this pastime. 

AVhere's the boy ? 

ELECTRA. 

Half-way to Phocis, Heaven helping 
him. 

yEGISTIIUS. 

By the black Styx ! 

ELECTRA. 

Take not the oath of Gods, 
Who art but half a man, blasphem- 
ing coward ! 

.EGISTHUS. 

But you, by Heaven, if this be a 

sword, 
Shall not be any more — 



A slave to thee, 
Blundering bloodshed der, though 
thou boast thyself 



, , ,*^^,''^ ',.; . , . t As huge as Ossa piled on Pelion, 

hold the life of each in gage for y^. -^^xxn^^ but that weak wretch 



his 
If any know Avhere now he hides 

from us, 
Let him beware, not rendering true 

reply ! 

CHORUS. 

The boy is fled — 

ELECTRA. 

— is saved ! 

^GISTHUS. 

Electra here ! 
How mean you ? What is this ? 

ELECTRA. 

Enough is left 
Of Agamemnon's blood to drown 
you i4, 



thou art ! 
O, thou hast only half done thy 

black work ! 
Thou shouidst have slain the young 

lion with the old. 
Look that he come not back, and 

find himself 
Ungiven food, and still the lion's 

share ! 

iEGISTHUS. 

Insolent ! but I know to seal thy 
lips — 

ELECTRA. 

— For thou art only strong among 

the weak. 
We know thou hast an aptitude for 

blood. 
To take a woman's is an easy task, 
Au4 one well worthy tUe^j 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



393 



uEGISTHUS. 

O, bul for Avords ! 

ELECTRA. 

Yet, coiildst thou feed on all the no- 
ble blood 
Of godlike generations on this earth, 
It should not help thee to a hero's 
heart. 

CHORUS. 

peace, Eiectra, but for pity's sake ! 
Heap not his madness to such dan- 
gerous heights. 

ELECTRA. 

1 will speak out my heart's scorn, 

though I die. 

^GISTUUS. 

And thou shalt die, but not till I 

liave tamed 
That stubborn spirit to a wish for 

life. 

CHORUS. 

O cease, infatuate ! I hear the 
Queen. 

\By a movement of the Eccyclema 
the palace is thrown open, and 
discovers Ci.ytejinestka sirtiuZ- 
ing over the body of Agamem- 
non. 

XIX. CLYTEMNESTRA. CHO- 
RUS. ^GISTHUS. ELECTRA. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

Argives ! behold the man who was 
your King ! 

CHORUS. 

Dead ! dead ! 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

Not I, but Fate hath dealt this blow. 

CHORUS. 

Dead ! dead, alas ! look where he 

lies, O friends ! 
That noble head, and to be brought 

§0 low I 



CLYTEMNESTRA. 

He who set light by woman, with 
blind scorn. 

And held her with the beasts we sac- 
rifice. 

Lies, by a woman sacrificed himself. 

This is high justice which appeals to 
you. 

CHORUS. 

Alas ! alas ! I know not words for 
this. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

We are but as the instrument of 
heaven. 

Our work is not design, but destiny. 

A God directs the lightning to its 
fall ; 

It smites and slays, and passes other- 
where. 

Pure in itself, as when, in light, it 
left 

The bosom of Olympus, to its end 

In this cold heart the wrong c f all 
the past 

Lies buried. 1 avenged, and I for- 
give. 

Honor him yet. He is a king, 
though fallen. 



O, how she sets Virtue's own crest 

on Crime, 
And stands there stern as Fates wild 

arbitress ! 
Not any deed could make her less 

than great. 

(CLYTEMNESTRA descends the 
steps, and lays her hand on the 
arm of ^gisthus.) 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

Put up the sword ! Enough of 
blood is spilt. 

^gisthus. 

Hist! O, not half, — Orestes is 
escaped, 



394 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



CLYTEMNESTRA. 

Sufficient for the future be that 

thought. 
What's done is well done. What's 

undone — yet more : 
Something still saved from crime. 

^GISTHUS. 

This lion's whelp 
Will work some mischief yet. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

He is a child — 
■ — Our own — we will but war upon 

the strong. 
Not upon infants. Let this matter 

rest. 

^GISTHUS. 

O, ever, in the wake of thy great 
will 

Let me steer sure ! and we will leave 
behind 

Great tracks of light upon the won- 
dering world. 

If but you err not here — 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

These pale-eyed groups ! 
See how they huddle shuddering, 

and stand round ; 
As when some mighty beast, the 

brindled lord 
Of the rough woodside, sends his 

wild death-roar 
Up the shrill caves, the meaner 

denizens 
Of ancient woods, shy deer, and 

timorous hares, 
Peer from the hairy thickets, and 

shrink back. 
We feared the lion, and we smote 

him down. 
Now fear is over. Shall we turn 

aside 
To harry jackals ? Laugh ! we have 

not laughed 
So long, I think you have forgotten 

how! 



Have we no right to laugh like 

other men ? 
Ha ! Ha ! I laugh. Now it is time 

to laugh ! 

CHORU.S. 

O, awful sight ! Look where the 

bloody sun. 
As though with Agamemnon he 

were slain. 
Runs reeking, lurid, down the palace 

floors ! 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

O my beloved ! Now we will reign 
sublime, 

And set our foot upon the neck of 
Fortune ! 

And for the rest— O, much re- 
mains !— for you, 

[Toilie Chorus.) 

A milder sway, if mildly you submit 

To our free service and supremacy. 

Nor tax, nor toll, to carry dim re- 
sults 

Of distant war beyond the perilous 
seas. 

But gateless justice in our halls of 
state, 

And peace in all the borders of our 
land ! 

For you — 

{To Electra, who has thrown 
herself upon the body of Aga- 
memnon. ) 

electra. 

O, hush ! What more remains to 

me, 
But this dead hand, whose clasp is 

cold in mine ? 
And all the baffled memory of the 

past. 
Buried with liim ? What more ? 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

— A mother's heart, 
If you will come to it. Free con- 
fidence. 



A liberal share in all our future 

hope. 
Now, more than ever — mutually 

weak — 
We stand in need, each of the 

other's love. 
Our love ! it shall not sacrifice thee, 

child, 
To wanton whims of war, as he, of 

old, 
Did thy dead sister. If you will not 

these, [then — 

But answer love with scorn, why 



ELECTIIA. 



-W'iiat then ? 



CLYTEMNESTRA. 

8afe silence. And permission to 
forget. 

XX. CHORUS. SEMI-CHORUS. 
CLYTEMNESTRA. CASSAN- 
DRA. ^GISTHUS. 

CHORUS. 

What shall we say ? What has been 

done ? 
Shed no te;ir ! O, shed no tear ! 
Hang up his liarness in the sun ; 
The hooked cur, and barbed spear ; 
And all war's adamantine gear 
Of trophied spoils ; for airiiis toils 
Are over, alas ! are over, and done ! 
What shall we say ? What has been 

done ? 
Shed no tear ! O, shed no tear ! 
But keep solemn silence all, 
As befits when heroes fall ; 
Solon n as his fame is ; sad 
As his end was ; earth shall wear 
Mourning for him. See, the sun 
Blushes red for what is done ! 
And the wild stars, one by one, 
Peer out of the lurid air. 
And shrink back with awe and fear, 
Shuddering, for what is done. 
When the night comes, dark and 

dun 
As our sorrow ; blackness far 
Shutting out the crimson sun ; 



Turn his face to the moon and 

star, — [are, 

These are briglit as his glories 
And great Heaven shall see its son 1 
What shall we say? What has been 

done ? 
Shed no tear ! O, shed no tear ! 
Gather round him, friends ! Look 

here ! 
All the wreaths Avhich he hath won 
In the race that he hath run, — 
Laurel garlands, every one ! 
These are things to think upon, 
Mourning till the set of sun. 
Till the mourning moon appear. 
Now the wreaths which Fame begun 
To uplift, to crown his head. 
Memory shall seize upon, 
And make chaplets for his bier. 
He shall have wreaths though he be 

dead ! 
But his monument is here. 
Built up in our hearts, and dear 
To all honor. Shed no tear ! 
O, let not any tear be shed ! 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

Look at Cassandra ! she is stooping 
down. 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

She dips and moves her fingers in 
the blood ! 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

Look to her ! There's a wildness in 
her eye ! 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

What does she ? 

SEMI-CHORUS. 

O, in Agamemnon's blood, 
She hath writ Orestes on the palace 
steps ! 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

^gistbus ! 

^GISTHUS. 

Queen and bride 1 



39^ 



CL YTEMNESTRA. 



CLYTEMXESTRA. 

We have not failed. 

CHORUS. 

Come, venerable, and ancient Night! 
From sources of the westei'n stars, 
In darkest shade tliat fits this woe. 
Consoler of a thousand griefs. 
And likest death unalterably calm. 
We toil, aspire, and sorrow. 
And in a little while shall cease. 
For we know not whence we came, 
And who can insure tlie morrow ? 
Thou, eternally the same. 
From of old, in endless peace 
Eternally survi vest ; 
Enduring on through good and ill, 
Coeval with the Gods ; and still 
In thine own silence livest. 
Our days thou leadest home [Again! 
To tlie great Whit]>er which has no 
Impartiality to pleasure and to pain 
Thou sett'st the bourn. To thee 
shall all things come. 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

But, if he cease to love me, what is 
gained ? 

CASSANDRA. 

Witli wings darkly spreading. 
Like ravens to the carcass 
Scenting far off the savor of blood, 
From shores of the unutterable 

River. 
They gather and swoop, 
They waver, they darken. 
From the fangs tbat raven, 
From the eyes that glare 
Intolerably fierce. 
Save me, Apollo ! 
Ai ! Ai ! Ai ! 
Alinon ! Alinon ! 

Blood, blood ! and of kindred nature, 
Which the young wolf I'eturning 
.Shall dip his fangs in, 
Tbereby accursedly 
Imbibing madness ! 

CHORUS. 

The wild woman is uttering strange 

things 
Fearful to iisteu to. 



CEYTEMNESTRA. 

Witliin the house 
Straiglitway confine her, 
There to learn wisdom. 

^GISTHUS. 

Orestes — O, this child's life now out- 
weighs 

That mighty ruin, Agamemnon 
dead! 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

^gisthus, dost thou love me ? 

^GISTHUS. 

As my life! 

CLYTEMNESTRA. 

Thou lovest me ! O love, we have 

not failed. 
Give me thy hand ! So . , . lead me 

to the house. 
Let me lean on thee. I am very 

weak. 



Only Heaven is high. 

Only the Gods are great. 

Above the search less sky. 

In uni'emove'd state. 

They from their golden mansions 

Look over the lands, and the seas ; 

The ocean's wide expansions. 

And the earth's varieties : 

Secure of their supremacy, 

And sure of atllaent ease. 

Wlio shall say, " I stand ! " nor 

fall ? 
Destiny is over all ! 
Rust will crumble old renown. 
Bust and cohnun tumble down ; 
Keep and castle; tower and town; 
Throne and sceptre ; crest and 

crown. 
Destiny is over all I 
One by one the pale guests fall 
At lighted feast, in palace hall ; 
Antl feast is turned to funeral. 
Who shall say, "1 stand!" nor 

fall ? 
Destiny is over all I 



GOOD-NIGHT IN THE PORCH. 397 



GOOD-NIGHT IN THE PORCH. 

A LITTLE longer in tlie light, love, let me be. The air is warm. 

I hear the cuckoo's last good-night float from the copse below the Farm. 

A little longer, Sister sweet, — your hand in mine, — on this old seat. 

In yon red gable, which the rose creeps round and o'er, your casement 

shines 
Ag:;inst the yellow west, o'er those forlorn and solitary pines. 
The long, long day is nearly done. How silent all the place is grown ! 

\ 
The stagnant levels, one and all, are burning in the distant marsh — \ 

H"ark ! 'twas the bittern's parting call. The frogs are out : with murmurs \ 

harsh I 

The low reeds vibrate. See I the sun catches the long pools one by one. \ 

\ 
A moment, and those orange flats will turn dead graj or lurid white. ? 

Look up! o'erhead the winnowing bats are come and gone, eluding sight, 
riie little worms are out. The snails begin to move down shining trails. 

With stow pink cones, and soft wet horns. The garden-bowers are dim 

with dew. 
With sparkling drops the white-rose thorns are twinkling, where the sun 

slips through 
Those reefs of coral buds hung free below the purple Judas-tree. 

From the warm upland comes a gust made fragrant with the brown hay 

there. 
The meek cows, with their white horns thrust above the hedge, stand still 

and stare. 
The steaming horses from the wains droop o'er the tank their plaited 

manes. 

And o'er yon hillside brown and barren (where you and I as children 

played. 
Starting the rabbit to his warren), I hear the sandy, shrill cascade 
Leap down upon the vale, and spill his heart out round the muffled mill. 

O can it be for nothing only that God has shown his world to me ? 

Or but to leave the heart more lonely with loss of beauty . . . can it be ? 

O closer, closer, Sister dear . . . nay, I have kist away that tear. 

God bless you. Dear, for that kind thought which only upon tears could 

rise ! 
God bless you for the love that sought to hide them in those drooping eyes, 
Whose lids I kiss ! . . . poor lids, so red ! but let my kiss fall there 

instead. 



398 GOOD-NIGHT IN THE PORCH. 



Yes, sad indeed it seems, each night, — and sadder, Dear, for your sweet 

sake ! 
To watch tlie last low lingering light, and know not where the morn may 

break, 
To-night we sit together here. To-morrow night will come . . . ah, 

whei'e ? 

O child ! howe'er assured be faith, to say farewell is fraught with gloom. 
When, like one flower, the germs of death and genius ripen toward the 

tomb ; 
And earth each day, as some fond face at parting, gains a graver grace. 

There's not a flower, there's not a tree in this old garden where we sit. 
But what some fragrant memory is closed and folded up in it. 
To-night the dog-rose smells as wild, as fresh, as when 1 was a child. 

'Tis eight years since (do you forget ?) we set those lilies near the wall : 
You were a blue-eyed child : even yet I seem to see the ringlets fall, — 
Tlie golden ringlets, blown behind your shoulders in the meny wind. 

Ah, me ! old times, they cling, they clirg ! And oft by yonder green old 

gate 
The field shows through, in morns of spring, an eager boy, I paused elate 
With all sweet fancies loosed from school. And oft, you Jvuow, when eves 

were cool, 

In summer-time, and through the trees j-oung gnats began to be about. 
With some old book upon your knees 'twas here you watched the stars 

come out. 
While oft, to please me, you sang through some foolish song I made for 

you. 

And there's my epic — I began when life seemed long, though longer 

art — 
And all the glorious deeds of man made golden riot in my heart — 
Eight books ... it will not number nine ! I die before my heroine. 

Sister ! they say that drowning men in one wild moment can recall 
Their whole life long, and feel again the pain — the bliss — that thronged 

it all :— 
Last night those phantoms of the Past ag;ii!i came crowding round me 

fast. 

Near morning, when the lamp was low, against the wall they seemed to 

flit; 
And, as the wavei'ing light would glow or fall, they came and went with 

it. 
The ghost of boyhood seemed to gaze down the dark verge of vanishtdays. 

Once more the garden where she walked on summer eves to tend her 

flowers. 
Once more the lawn where first we talked of future years in twilight hours 
Arose ; once more she seemed to pass before me in the waving grass 



GOOD-NIGHT IN THE PORCH 399 

To that old terrace ; her bright hair about her warm neck all undone, 

And waving on the balmy air, with tinges of the dying sun. 

Just one star kindling in the west : just one bird singing near its nest. 

So lovely, so beloved ! O, fair as though that sun had never set 
Which staved upon her golden hair, in dreams I seem to see her yet ! 
To see her in that old green ^jlace,— the same husht, smiling, cruel face ! 

A little older, love, than you ar« now ; and I was then a boy ; 
And wild and wayward-hearted too ; to her my passion was a toy, 
Soon broken ! ah, a foolish thing,— a butterfly with crumpled wing ! 

Her hair, too, was like yours,— as bright, but with a w^armer golden tinge: 
Her eyes, — a somewhat deeper light, and dreamed below a longer fringe : 
And still that strange grave smile she had stays in my heart and keeps it 
sad ! 

There's no one knows it, truest friend, but you, for I have never breathed 
To other ears the frozen end of those spring-garlaiuls Hope once wreathed ; 
And death will come before again I breathe that name untouched by pain ! 

From little things — a star, a flower — that touched us with the self-same 

thought, 
My passion deepened hour by hour, until to that fiei'ce heat 'twas wrought. 
Which, shrivelling over every nerve, crumbled the outworks of reserve. 

I told her then, in that wild time, the love I knew she long had seen ; 
The accusing uain that burned like crime, yet left me nobler than I had 

been ; 
What matter with what words I « ooed her ? She said I had misunderstood 

her. 

And something more — small matter what ! of friendship something — 

sisters love — 
She said that I was young — knew not my own heart — as the years would 

prove — 
She wished me happy — she conceived an interest in me — and believed 

I should grow up to something great — and soon forget her — soon forget 

This fancj- — and congratulate my life she had released it, yet — 

With more such words — a lie ! a lie! She broke my heart, and flung it by I 

A life's libation lifted up, from her proud lip she dashed untasted: 
There trampled lay love's costly cup, and in the dust the wine was 

wasted. 
She knew I could not pour such wine again at any other shrine. 

Then I remember a numb mood : mad murmurings of the words she 
said : 

A slow shame smouldering through my blood ; that surged and sung with- 
in my head : 

And drunken sunlights reeling through the leaves : above, the burnisht 
blue 



+ 



4O0 GOOD-NTGHT TM THE PORCff. 

Hot on my eyes, — a blazing shiekl : a noise among tlie waterfalls : 

A free crow up the brown cornfield floating at will : faint shepherd-calls: 

And reapers reaping in the shocks of gold : and girls with purple frocks: 

All which tlie more confused my brain : and nothing could I realize 
But the great fact of my own pain : I saw the fields : I heard the cries : 
The crow's shade dwindled up the hill : the world went on : my heart 
stood still. 

I thought I held in my hot hand my life crusht up : I could have tost 
The crumpled riddle from me, and laughed loud to think what I had lost. 
A bitter strength was in my mind ; like Samson, when she scorned him — 
blind. 

And casting reckless arms about the props of life to hug them down, — 
A madmanwith his eyes put out. But all niv anger was my own. 
I spared the worm upon my walk : I left iii-' >vliite rose on its stalk. 

Airs over long since. Was it strange that I was mad with grief and 

shame ? 
And I would cross the seas, and change my ancient home, my father's 

name ? 
In the wild hope, if that might be, to change my own identity ! 

T know that I was wrong : I know it was not well to be so wild. 

But the scorn stung so ! . . . Pity now could w^ovmd not ! . . . I have seen 

her child : 
It had the self-same eyes she had : their gazing almost made me mad. 

Dark violet eyes whose glances, deep -with April hints of suimy tears, 
'Neath long soft lashes laid asleep, seemed all too thoughtful for her 

years ; 
As though from mine her gaze had caught the secret of some mournful 

thought. 

But, when she spoke her father's air broke o'er her . . . that clear con- 
fident voice ! 
Some happy souls there are, that wear their nature lightly ; these rejoice 
The world "by living ; and receive from all men more than what they give. 

One handful of their buoyant chaff exceeds our hoards of careful grain : 
Because their love breaks through their laugh, while ours is fraught with 

tender pain : 
The world, that knows itself too sad, is proud to keep some faces glad : 

And, so it is ! from such an one Misfortune softly steps aside 
To let him still walk in the sun. These things must be. I cannot chide. 
Had I been she I might have made the self-same choice. She shunned the 
shade. 

To some men God hath given laughter ; but tears to some men he hath 

given : 
He bade us sov^^ in tears, hereafter to harvest holier smiles in Heaven : 
And tears and smiles, they are His gift : both good, to smite or to uplift : 



GOOD-NIGNT IN THE PORCH. Aox 

He knows His sheep : the wind and showers beat not too sharply thft 

shorn lamb : 
His wisdom is more wise than ours : He knew my natm-e — what I am : 
He tempers smiles with tears : both good, to bear in time the Christian 

mood. 

O yet — in scorn of mean relief, let Sorrow bear her heavenly fruit ! 
Better the wildest hour of grief than the low pastime of the brute ! 
Better to weep, for He wept too, than laugh as every fool can do ! 

For sure, 'twere best to bear the cross ; nor lightly fling the thorns 

behind ; 
Lest we gi-ow happy by the loss of what was noblest in the mind, 
— Here— in the ruins of my years — Father, 1 bless Thee through these 

tears ! 

It was in the far foreign lands this sickness came upon me first. 

Below strange suns, 'mid alien hands, this fever of the south was nurst. 

Until it reached some vital part. I die jiot of a broken heart. 

O think not that ! If I could live . . . there's much to live for — 

worthy life. 
It is not for what fame could give — though that I scorn not — but the strife 
Were noble for its own sake too. I thought that I had much to do — 

But God is wisest ! Hark, again ! . . . 'twas yon black bittern, as he 

rose 
Against the wild light o'er the fen. How red your little casement glows ! 
The night falls fast. How lonely. Dear, this bleak old house will look 

next year ! 

So sad a thought ? . . . ah, yes ! I know it is not good to brood on this : 
And yet — such thoughts will come and go, unbidden. Tis that you 

should miss, 
My darling, one familiar tone of this weak voice when I am gone. 

And, for that's past, — I will not say in what she did that all was right, 
But all's forgiven ; and I pray for her heart's welfare, day and night. 
All things are changed ! This cheek would glow even near hers but 
I faintly now ! 

Thou — God ! before whose sleepless eye not even in vain the sparrows 
fall, 
.• Receive, sustain me ! Sanctify my soul. Thou know'st. Thou lovest all. 
Too weak to walk alone — I see Thy hand : I falter back to Thee. 

Saved from the curse of time which throws its baseness on us day by day : 
Its wretched joys, and worthless woes ; till all the heart is worn away. 
j I feel Thee near. I hold my breath, by the half-opc-.i doors of Death. 

: And sometimes, glimpses froiu within of glyry (wondrous sight and 
sound I) 



402 GOOD-NIGHT IN THE PORCH. 

Float near me : — faces pure from sin ; strange music ;. saints with splendor 

' crowned : 
I seem to feel my native air blow down from some high region there, 

And fan my spirit pure : I rise above the sense of loss and pain : 

Faint forms that lured my childhood's eyes, long lost, I seem to find 

again : 
I see the end of all : I feel hope, awe, no language can reveal. 

Forgive me. Lord, if overmuch I loved that form Thou mad'st so fair ; 
I know that Thou didst make her such ; and fair but as the flowers 

were, — 
Thy work : her beauty was but Thine ; the human less than the divine. 

My life hath been one search for Thee 'mid thorns -found red with Thy 

dear blood ; 
In many a dark Gethsemanc I seemed to stand where Thou hadst stood : 
And, scorned in this world's Judgment-Place, at times, through tears, to 

catch Thy face. 

Thou suffered' st here, and didst not fail : Thy bleeding feet these paths 

have trod : 
But Thou wert strong, and I am frail : and I am man, and Thou wert 

God. 
Be near me : keep me in Thy sight : or lay my soul asleep in light. 

O to be where the meanest mind is more than Shakespeare I where one 

look 
Shows more than here the wise can find, though toiling slow from book to 

book ! 
Where life is knowledge : love is sure : and hope's brief promise made 

secure. 

dying voice of human praise ! the crude ambitions of raj' youth ! 

1 long to pour immurtal lays ! great pteaus of perennial Truth ! 

A larger work ! a loftier aim ! . . . and what are laurel-leaves and fame ? 

ATid what are words ? How little these the silence of the soul express ! 
Mere froth, — the foam and flower of seas whose hungering waters heave 

and press 
Against the planets and the sides of night, — mute, yearning, mystic 

tides ! 

To ease tlie heart with song is sweet : sweet to be heard if heard by love. 
And you liave heard me. When we meet shall we not sing the old songs 

above 
To grander music ? Sweet, one kiss. O blest it is to die like this ! 

To lapse from being without pain : your hand in mine, on mine your 

heart : 
The unshaken faith to meet again that sheathes the pang with which we 

part : 
My head upon your bosom, sweet : your hand in mine, on this old seat 1 



-1 



THE EARUS RETURN. 



403 



So ; closer wind that tender arm . . . How the hot tears fall ! Do not 

weep, 
Beloved, but let your smile stay warm about me. " In the Lord they 

sleep." 

. O light, O Glory ! ... is 



You know the words the Scripture saith 
this death ? 



THE EARL'S RETURN. 



Ragged and tall stood the castle 

wall 
And the squires at their sport, in 

the great South Court, 
Lounged all dav long from stable to 

^hall 
. Laughingly, lazilj% one and all. 
The land about was barren and 

blue, 
And swept by the wing of the wet 

sea-mew. 
Seven fishermen's huts on a shelly 

shore : 
Sand-heaps behind, and sand-banks 

before : 
And a blhc'c champaign streaked 

white all through 
To a great salt pool which the ocean 

drew, 
Sucked into itself, and disgorged it 

again 
To stagnate and steam on the min- 
eral plain ; 
Not a tree or a bush in the circle of 

sight. 
But a bare black thorn which the 

sea-winds had withered 
With the drifting scum of the surf 

and blight, 
And some patches of gray grass- 
land to the right. 
Where the lean red-hided cattle 

were tethered : 
A reef of rock wedged the water in 

twain, 
Aud a stout stone tower stood square 

to the main. 



And the flakes of the spray that 

were jerked away 
From the froth on the lip of the 

bleak blue sea 
Were sometimes flung by the wind, 

as it swung 
Over turret and terrace and balcony, 
To the garden below where, in 

desolate corners 
Under the mossy green parapet 

there. 
The lilies crouched, rocking their 

white heads like mourners, 
And burned off the heads of the 

flowers that were 
Pining and pale in their comfortless 

bowers. 
Dry-bushed with the sharp stubborn 

lavender. 
And paven with disks of the torn 

sunflowers. 
Which, day by day, were strangled, 

and stripped 
Of their ravelling fringes and brazen 

bosses, 
And the hardy mary-bilds nipped and 

ripped 
Into shreds for the beetles that lurked 

in the mosses. 

Here she lived alone, and from year 
to year [appear 

She saw the black belt of the ocean 

At her casement each morn as she 
rose ; and each morn 

Her eye fell first on the bare black 
thorn. 



Tliis was all : nothing more : or 

sometimes on the shore 
The fishermen sang when the fish- 
ing was o'er ; 
Or the lowing of oxen fell dreamily, 
Close on the shnt of the glimmering 

eves, 
Throngh some gnsty panse in the 

moaning sea, 
When the pools were splashed pink 

by the thirsty beeves 
Or sometimes, when 'the pearl- 
lighted morns drew the tinges 
Of the cold sunrise up their amber 

fringes, 
A white sail peered over the rim of 

the main. 
Looked all about o'er the empty sea, 
►Staggering back from the fine line of 

wliite light again, 
And dropped down to another world 

silently. 
Then she breathed freer. With 

sickening dread 
She had watched five pale young 

moons unfold 
From their notchy cavern in light, 

and spread 
To the fuller light, and again grow 

old. 
And dwindle away to a luminous 

shred. 
" He will not come back till the 

Spring's green and gold. 
And I would that I with the leaves 

wei'e dead, 
Quiet somewhere with them in the 

moss and the mould. 
When he and the summer come this 

way," she said. 
And when the dull sky darkened 

down to the edges. 
And the keen frost kindled in star 

and spar, 
The sea might be known by a noise 

on the ledges 
Of the long crags, gathering power 

from afar 
Throiighhis roaring bays, and crawl- 
ing bade [dragged 
Hissing, as o'er the wet pebbleshe 



His skirt of foam frayed, dripping, 

and jagged. 
And reku-tanily fell down the smooth 

hollow shell 
Of the night, whose lustrous surface 

of black 
In spots to an intense blue was 

worn. 
But later, when up on the sullen sea- 
bar 
The wide large-lighted moon had 

arisen. 
Where the dark and voluminous 

ocean grew luminous. 
Helping after her slowly one little 

shy star 
That shook blue in the cold, and 

looked forlorn. 
The clouds were troubled, and the 

wind from his prison 
Behind them leaped down with a 

light laugh of scorn ; 
Then the last thing she saw was that. 

bare black tliorn ; 
Or the foi-ke'd tree, as the bleak 

blast took it, 
Howled through it, and beat It, and 

bit it, and shook it, 
Seemed to visibly waste and wither 

and wizen. 

And the snow was lifted into the air 
' Layer by layer. 
And tiu'ned into vast white clouds 

that flew 
Silent and fleet up the sky, and 

wei'c riven 
And jerked into chasms which the 

sun leaped through. 
Opening crystal gulfs of a breezy 

blue 
Fed with rainy lights of the April 

heaven. 
From eaves and leaves the quivering 

dew 
Sparkled off ; and ,the rich earth, 

black and bare. 
Was starred Avith snowdrops every- 
where ; 
And the crocus upturned its flame, 

and burned 



THE EARVS RETURN. 



405 



Here and there. 

" The Summer," she said, " ometh 
bUthe and bold ; 

And the crocus is lit for her welcom- 
ing ; 

And tlie days will have garments of 
purple and gold ; 

But I would be left by the jiale green 
Spring 

With the snowdrops somewhere 
under the mould ; 

For I tlaro not think what the 
Summer may bring." 

Pale she was as the bramble blooms 
That fill the long fields with their 

faint perfumes. 
When the May-wind flits finely 

through sun-threaded showers, 
Breathing low to himself in his dim 

meadow-bowers. 
And her cheek each year was paler 

and thinner, 
And white as the pearl that was hung 

at her ear. 
As her sad heart sickened and pined 

within her. 
And failed and fainted from j'ear to 

year. 
So that the Seneschal, rough and 

gray, 
Said, as he looked in her face one 

day, 
*' St. Catherine save all good souls, 

I pray, 
For our pale young lady is paling 

away. 
O the Saints," he said, smiling bitter 

and grim, 
" Know she's too fair and too good for 

him ! " 
Sometimes she walked on the upper 

leads. 
And leaned on the arm of the 

weatherworn Warden. 
Sometimes she sat 'twixt the mildewy 

beds 
Of the sea-singed flowers in the 

Pleasaimce Garden. 
Till the rotting blooms that lay 

thick on tlie walks 



Were combed by the white sea-gust 
like a rake. 

And the stimulant steam of the 
leaves and stalks 

Made the coile'd memory, numb and 
cold, 

That slept in her heart like a dream- 
ing snake. 

Drowsily lift itself, fold by fold, 

And gnaw and gnaw hungrily, half 
awake. 

Sometimes she looked from the 

window below 
To the great South Court and the 

squires, at their sport, 
Loungingly loitering to and fro. 
She heaixl the grooms there as they 

cursed one another. 
She heard the great bowls falling all 

day long 
In the bowling-alleys. She heard 

the song 
Of the shock-headed Pages that drank 

without stint in 
The echoing courts, and swore hard 

at each other. 
She saw the red face of the rough 

wooden Quintin, 
And the swinging sand-bag ready 

to smother 
The awkward Squire that missed the 

mark. 
And, all day long, between the dull 

noises 
Of the bowls, and the oaths, and the 

singing voices, 
The sea boomed hoarse till the skies 

were dark. 

But when the swallow, that sweet 

new-comer, 
Floated over the sea in the front of 

the summer. 
The salt dry sands burned white, and 

sickened 
j Men's sight in the glaring horn of the 

bay ; 
! And all things that fasten, or float at 
i ease 

I In the silvery light of the leprous 

seas 



4o6 



THE EARVS RETURN. 



With the pulse of a hideous life were 

quickened, 
Fell loose from the rocks, and 

crawled crosswise away, 
Slippery sidelong crabs, half 

strangled 
By the while sea grasses in which 

they were taiigled, 
And those half-llvixig creatui'es, 

orbed, rayed, and sharp- 
angled. 
Fan-fish, and star-fish, and polypous 

lumps, 
Hueless and boneless, that languidly 

thickened, 
Or flat-faced, or spike'd, or ridge'd 

with humps, 
Melting off from their clotted clusters 

and clumps 
Sprawled over the shore in the heat 

of the day. 

An hour bef6re the sun was set 

A darker ripple I'olled over the sea ; 

The wliite rocks quivei'ed in wells of 
jet ; 

And the great West, opening breath- 
lessly 

Up all his inmost orange, gave 

Hints of something distant and 
sweet 

That made her heart swell ; far up 
the wave 

The clouds that lay piled in the 
golden heat 

Wei'e turned into types of the an- 
cient momitains 

In an ancient land ; the weeds, 
which forlorn 

Waves were swaying neglectfully. 

By their sounds, as they dipped into 
sparkles that dripped 

In the emerald creeks that ran up 
from the shore, 

Brought back to her fancy the bub- 
ble of fountanis 

Leaping and falling continually 

In valleys where she should wander 
no more. 

And when, over all of these, the 
night 



Among, her mazy and milk white 

signs. 
And clustered orbs, and zigzag lines, 
Burst into blossom of stars and 

light. 
The sea was glassy ; the glassy brine 
Was pa\'en with lights, — blue, crys- 
talline. 
And emerald keen ; the dark world 

hung 
Balanced under the moon, and 

swung 
In a net of silver sparkles. Then 

she 
Rippled her yellow hair to her knee, 
Bared her warm white bosom and 

throat, 
And from the lattice leaned athirst. 
There, on the silence did she gloat 
With a dizzy pleasure steeped in 

pain. 
Half catching the soul of the secret 

that b'ended 
God with his starlight, then feeling 

it vain. 
Like a pining poet ready to burst 
With the weight of the wonder that 

grows in his brain. 
Or a nightingale, mute at the sound 

of a lute 
That is swelling and breaking his 

heart with its strain. 
Waiting, breathless, to die when the 

music is ended. 
For the sleek and beautiful midnight 

stole. 
Like a faithless friend, her secret 

care, 
Crept through each pore to the 

source of the soul. 
And mocked at the angush which he 

found there. 
Shining away from her, scornful and 

fair 
In his pitiless beauty, refusing to 

share 
The discontent which he could not 

control. 

The water-rat, as he skulked in the 
moat, 



THE EARL'S RETURN. 



407 



Set all the slumbrous lilies afloat, 
And sent a sharp quick pulse along 
The stagnant light, that heaved and 

swung 
The leaves together. Suddenly 
At times a shooting star would spin 
Shell-like out of heaven, and tumble 

in, 
And burst o'er a city of stars ; but 

she, 
As he dashed on the back of the zo- 
diac, 
And quivered and glowed down arc 

and node. 
And split sparkling into infinity. 
Thought that some angel, in his rev- 
eries 
Thinking of earth, as he pensively 
Leaned over the star-grated balcony 
In his palace among the Pleiades, 
And grieved for the sorrow he saw 

in the land, 
Had dropped a white lily from his 
loose hand. 

And thus many a night, steeped pale 

in the light 
Of the stars, Avhen the bells and 

clocks 
Had ceased in the towers, and the 

sound of the hours 
Was eddying about in the rocks, 
Deep-sunken in bristling broidery 

between the black oak Fiends 

sat she, 
And imder the moth-flitted canopy 
Of the mighty antique bed in her 

chamber. 
With wild eyes drinking up the sea. 
And her wiiite hands heavy with 

jewelry. 
Flashing as she loosed languidly 
Her satins of snow and of amber. 
And as, fold by fold, these were rip- 
pled and rolled 
To her feet, and lay huddled in ruins 

of gold, 
She looked like some pale spirit 

above 
Earth's dazzling passions forever 

fluug by, 



Freed from the stains of an eartlily 

love. 
And those splendid shackles of i^ride 

that press 
On the heart till it aches with the 

gorgeous stress. 
Quitting the base Past remorsefully. 
And so she put by the coil and care 
Of the day that lay furled like an 

idle weft 
Of heape'd spots which a bright snake 

hath left. 
Or that dark house, the blind worm's 

lair. 
When the star-winge'd moth from 

the windows hath crept, 
Steeped her soul in a tearful prayer. 
Shrank into her naked self, and 

slept. 

And as she slumbered, starred and 
eyed 

All over with angry gems, at her 
side. 

The Fiends in the oak kept ward 
and watch ; 

And the querulous clock, on its I'usty 
catch. 

With a quick tick, Inisky and thick, 

Clamored and clacked at her sharply, 
There was 

(Fi'onting a portrait of the Earl) 

A shrine with a dim green lamp, and 
a cross 

Of glowing cedar wreathed with 
pearl, [writ, 

Which the Arimathtean, so it was 

When he came from the-holy Orient, 

Had worn, with his prayers embalm- 
ing it. 

As with the San-Grael through the 
world he went. 

Underneath were relics and gems 

From many an antique king-saint's 
crown. 

And some ('twas avouched) from the 
dusk diadems 

And mighty rings of tliose Wise 
Kings 

Tliat evermore sleep 'mid the mar- 
ble stems. 



'Twixt chancel and chalice in God 
his palace, 

The marvel of Cologne Town. 

In a halo dim of the lamp all night. 

Smiled the sad Virgin, holy and 
Avhife, 

With a face as full of the soul's af- 
fliction 

As one that had looked on the Cru- 
cifixion. 

At moonrise the land was suddenly 

brighter ; 
And through all its length and 

breadth the casement 
Grew large with a luminous strange 

amazement, 
And, as doul)ting in dreams what 

that sudden blaze meant, 
The Lady's white face turned a 

thought wliiter. 
Sometimes in sleep light finger-tips 
Touched her behind ; the pain, the 

bliss 
Of a long slow despairing kiss 
Doubled the heat on her feverish 

lips, 
And down to her heart's-heart 

smouldering burned ; 
From lips long mute she heard her 

name ; 
Sad dreams and sweet to vex her 

came ; 
Sighing, upon her pillow, she turned, 
Like a weary waif on a weary sea 
That is heaving over continually. 
And finds no course, until for its 

sake 
The heart of the silence begins to 

ache. 
Uiisoothed from slumber .she awoke 
An hour ei-e dawn. The lamp 

burned faint. 
The Fiends glared at her out of the 

oalc. 
She rose, and fell at the shrine of 

tlie Saint. 
There with clasped hands to the 

Mother 
Of many sorrows, in sorrow, she 

prayed ; 



Till all things in the room melted 

into each other, 
And vanished in gyres of flickering 

shade, 
Leaving her all alone, with the face 
Of the Saint growing large in its one 

bright place. 
Then on a sudden, from far, a fear 
Through all her heart its horror 

drew. 
As of something hideous growing 

near. " | 

Cold fingers seemed roaming through 11 

her damp hair ; 
Her lips were locked. The jDower of 

prayer 
Left her. She dared not turn. She 

knew, 
From his panel atilt on the wall up 

there, 
The grim Earl was gazing her 

through and through. 

But when the casement, a grisly 

square. 
Flickered with day, she flung it wide, 
And looked below. The shore was 

bare. 
In the mist tumbled the dismal tide. 
One ghastly-pool seemed solid white; 
The forke'd shadow of the thorn 
Fell through it, like a raven rent 
In the steadfast blank down which 

it went. 
The blind world sloM'ly gathered 

sight. 
The sea was moaning on to morn. 

And the Summer into the Autumn 

M'aned. 
And under the watery Hyades 
The gray sea swelled, and the thick 

rained, 
And the land was darkened by slow 

degrees. 
But oft, in the low West, the day 
Smouldering sent up a sullen flame 
Along the dreary waste of gray. 
As though in that red region lay. 
Heaped up, like Autumn weeds and 

flowers 



THE EARL'S RETURN. 



409 



For fire, its thorny fruitless hours, 
And God said, " burn it all away ! " 

When all was dreariest in the skies, 
And the gusty tract of twilight mut- 
tered, 
A strange slow smile grew into her 

eyes, 
As though from a great way off it 

came 
And was weary ere down to her lii^s 

it flattered, 
And turned into a sigh, or some soft 

name 
Whose syllables sounded likest sighs, 
Half smothered in sorrow before 

they were uttered. 
Sometimes, at night, a music was 

rolled— 
A ripple of silver harp-strings cold — 
From the halls below where the 

Minstrel sung. 
With the silver hair, and the golden 

tongue, 
And the eyes of passionless, peaceful 

blue 
(Like twilight wdiicli faint stars gaze 

through). 
Wise with the years which no man 

knew. 
And first the music, as though the 

Mings 
Of some blind angel \vere caught in 

the strings, 
Fluttered with weak endeavor : anon 
The vmcaged heart of music grew 

bold 
And cautiously loosened, length hy 

length, 
The golden cone of its great under- 
tone, 
Like a strong man using mild lan- 
guage to one 
That is weaker, because he is sure of 

his strength. 

But once — and it was at the fall of 

the day, [seem 

When she, if she closed her eyes, did 

To be wandering far, in a sort of 

dream, 



With some lost shadow, away, 

away, 
Down the heart ol a golden land 

which she 
Remembered a great way over the 

sea, 
There came a trample of horses and 

men ; 
And a blowing of horns at the Castle- 
Gate ; 
Then a clattering noise ; then a 

pause ; and then. 
With the sudden jerk of a heavy 

weight, 
And a wi-angling and jangling and 

clinking and clanking, 
The sound of the falling of cable and 

chain ; 
And a grumbling over the dewy 

planking 
That shrieked and sung with the 

weight and strain ; 
And the rough Seneschal bawled out 

in the hall, 
" The Earl and the Devil are come 

back again ! " 

Her heart stood still for a moment 

or more. 
Then suddenly tugged, and strained, 

and tore 
At the roots, which seemed to give 

way beneath. 
She rushed to the window, and held 

her breath. 
High up on the beach were the long 

black ships 
And the bi-own sails hung from the 

masts in strips : 
And the surf was whirled over and 

over them, 
And swept them dripping from stern 

to stem. 
Within, in the great square com't be- 
low. 
Were a hundred rough-faced men, 

or so. 
And one or two pale fair-haired 

slaves 
Whom the Earl had brought over 

the winter waves. 



4IO 



THE EARUS RETURN. 



There was a wringing of horny 

hands ; 
And a swearing of oallis ; and a great 

deal of laugliter ; 
The grim Earl growling his hoarse 

commands 
To the Warden tliat followed him 

growling after ; 
A lowing of cattle along the wet 

sands ; 
And a plashing of hoofs on the slip- 
pery rafter, 
As tlie long-tailed black-maned 

horses each 
Went over tlie bridge from the gray 

sea-beach. 

Then quoth the grim Earl, "fetch 

me a stoop ! " 
And they brouglit liim a great bowl 

tliat dripped from the brim, 
Whicli he seized upon with a satis- 
fied whoop, 
Drained, and flung at the head of 

him 
That brought it ; then, with a lavigh 

like a howl, 
Stroked his beard ; and strode in 

through the door with a growl. 
Meanwhile tlie pale lady grew white 

and whiter, 
As the poplar pales when the keen 

winds smite her : 
And, as the tree sways to the gust, 

and heaves 
Quick ripples of white alarm up the 

leaves, 
So did slie seem to shrink and reel 
From tlie casement — one quiver from 

head to heel 
Of whitest fear. For she heard be- 
low, 
i On the creaking stairway loud and 

slow. 
Like drops that plunge audibly down 

from the thunder 
Into a sea that is groaning under, 
The heavy foot of the Earl as he 

mounted 
Step after step to the turret ; she 

counted 



Step after step, as he hastened or 

halted ; 
Now clashing shrill through the 

archways vaulted ; 
Now muffled and thick ; now loud, 

and more 
Loud as he came near the Chamber 

door. 
Then tliere fell, with a rattle and 

shock. 
An iron glove on the iron lock. 
And the door burst open — the Earl 

burst tlirough it — 
But she saw him not. The window- 
pane. 
Far off, grew large and small again ; 
The staggering light did wax and 

wane, 
Till there came a snap of the heavy 

brain ; 
And a slow-subsiding pulse of pain ; 
And the whole world darkened into 

rest. 
As the grim Earl pressed to his 

grausome breast 
His Avhite wife. She hung heavy 

tliere 
On his shoulder without breath, 
Darkly filled with sleepy deatli 
From her heart up to her eyes ; 
Dead asleep : and ere he knew it 
(How Death took her by surprise 
Helpless in lier 'great despair) 
Smoothing back her yellow hair, 
He kissed her icy brows : unwound 
His rough arms, and she fell to the 

ground. 

" The woman ivas fairer than she 

was ivise : 
But the serpent loas wiser than she 

loasfair : 
For the serpent luas lord in Paradise 
Or ever the woman came there. 
But when Eden-yates loere barred 

amain, 
And the fiery sword on guard in the 

East, 
The lion arose from a long rejyose, 
And quoth he, as he shook out hia 

royal mane, 



THE EARLS RETURN. 



411 



* iVoM) I am the strongest beast.' 
Had the ivoman been wiser when she 

loas queen 
The lion had never been king, I 

loeen. 
But ever since stormsbegan to lower 
Beauty on earth hath been second to 

Power." 
Aiul this is the song that the Minstrel 

sung, 
Witli the silver hair and the golden 

tongue, 
AVho sung by night in the grim Earl's 

hall. 
And they held him in reverence one 

and all. 

And so she died, — the pale-faced 

girl. 
And, for nine days after that, the 

Earl 
Fumed and fret, and raved and 

swore, 
Pacing up and down the chamber- 
floor, 
And tearing his black beard as he 

went, 
In the fit of his sullen discontent. 
And the Seneschal said it was fear- 

'ful to hear him ; 
And not even the weather-worn 

Warden went near him ; 
And the shock-headed Pages huddled 

anear. 
And bit their white lips till they bled, 

for fear. 

But at last he bade them lift her 
lightly. 

And bury her by the gray sea-shore. 

Where the winds that blew from her 
own land nightly 

Might wail round her grave through 
the wild rocks hoar. 

So they lifted her lightly at dead of 
night, 

And bore her down by the long torch- 
light,— 

Lank-haired faces, sallow and keen. 

That burned out of the glassy pools 
between 



The splashing sands which, as they 

plunged through. 
The coffin-lead weighed them down 

into ; 
And their feet, as they plucked them 

up, left pits 
Which the water oozed into and out 

of by fits — . 
— And so to the deep-mouthed bay's 

black brim. 
Where the pale priests, all white- 

stoled and dim, 
Lifted the cross and chanted the 

hyimi, 
That her soul might have peace when 

her bones were dust. 
And her name be written among the 

Just. 

The Warden walked after the Sen- 
eschal grim ; 

And the shock-headed Pages walked 
after him : 

And with mattock and spade a grave 
was made, 

Where they carved the cross, and 
they wrote her name, 

And, retiu-ning each by the way that 
he came. 

They left her under the bare black 
thorn. 

The salt sea-wind sang shrill in the 

head of it ; 
And the bitter night grew chill with 

the dread of it ; 
When the great round moon rose up 

forlorn 
From the reefs, and whitened to- 
wards the morn. 
For the forked tree, as the bleak 

blast took it, 
Howled through it, and beat it, and 

bit it, and shook it, 
Like a living thing, bewitched and 

bedeviled. 
Visibly shrunk, and shuddered and 

shrivelled. 

And again the swallow, that false 
new-comer. 



412 



THE EARL'S RETURN. 



Fluttered over the sea in the front 

of the siuuiiier ; 
A careless singer, as he should be 
That only sUinnneth the mighty sea; 
Dipped his wings as he came and 

went, 
And chirruped and twittered for 

heart's content, 
And built on the new-made grave. 

]>ut when 
The Summer was over he flew back 

again. 

And the Earl, as years went by, and 

his life 
Grew listless, took him another wife: 
And the Seneschal grim and the 

Warden gray 
Walked about in their wonted way : 
And the lean-jawed, shock-haired 

Pages too 
Sung and swilled as they used to do. 
And the grooms and the squires 

gamed and swore 
And quarrelled again as they quar- 
relled before ; 
And the flowers decayed in tlieir 

dismal beds. 
And dropped off from their lean 

shanks one by one, 
Till nothing was left but the stalks 

and the heads, 
Clumped into heaps, or ripped into 

shreds. 
To steam into salt in the sickly sun. 

And the cattle lowed late up the 

glimmering plain, 
Or dipped knee deep, and splashed 

themselves 
In the pools spat out by the spiteful 

main, 
Wallowing in sandy dykes and 

delves : 
And the blear-eyed filmy sea did 

l)oom 
With his old mysterious hungering 

sound : 
And the wet wind wailed in the 

chinks of the tomb, 
Till the weeds in the surf were 

drenched and drowned. 



But once a stranger came over the 

wave. 
And paused by the pale-faced Lady's 

grave. 

It was when, just about to set, 

A sadness held the sinking sun. 

The moon delayed to shine as yet : 

The Ave-Mary chime was done : 

And from the bell-tower, leaned the 
ringers ; 

And in the chancel paused the sing- 
ers, 

With lingering looks and claspe'd 
fingers : 

And the day reluctantly turned to 
his rest, 

Like some untold life, that leaves 
exprest 

But the half of its hungering love 
ere it close : 

So he went sadly toward his repose 

Deep in the heart of the slumbrous 
waves 

Kindled far off in the desolate West. 

And the Ijreeze sprang up in the cool 
sea- caves. 

The castle stood with its courts in 
shade, 

And all its toothed towers imprest 

On the sorrowful light that sunset 
made, — 

Such a light as sleeps shut up in the 
breast 

Of some pining crimson-hearted 
rose, 

Which, as yovi gaze at it, grows and 
grows 

And all the warm leaves overflows ; 

Leaving its sweet source still to be 
guest. 

The crumpled shadow of the thorn 

Crawled over the sand-heaps rag- 
gedly. 

And over the gray stone cross for- 
lorn, [there 

And on to that one man musing 

Moveless, while o'er him the night 
crept on. 

And the hot yellow stars slowly, one 
after one, 



TilE EARVS RETURN. 



413 



Mounted into the dark blue air 
And brightened, and briglitened. 

Then suddenly, 
And sadly and silently, 
Down the dim breezy brink of the 

sea sank the sun. 

Ere the moon was abroad, the owl 
Made himself heard in the echoing 

tower 
Three times, four times. The bat 

with his cowl 
Came and went round the lonely 

Bower 
Where dwelt of yore tlie Earl's lost 

Lady. 
There night after night, for years, in 

vain 
The lingering moon had looked 

through the pane. 
And missed the face she used to find 

there. 
White and wan like some mountain 

flower 
In its rocky nook, as it paled and 

pined there, 
Only known to the moon and the 

Avind there, 
liights flitted faint in the halls down 

lower 
From lattice to lattice, and then 

glowed steady. 

The dipping gull : and the long gray 

pool : 
And the reed that shows which way 

the breeze blows cool, 
From the wide Avarm sea to the low 

black land : 
And the wave makes no sound on 

the soft yellow sand : 
But the inland shallows sharp and 

small 
Are swarmed about with the sultry 

midge. 
And the land is still, and the ocean 

still : 
' And the weeds in the rifted rocks at 

will 
Move on the tide, and float or glide. 
And into the silent western side 



Of the heaven the moon begins to 

fall. 
But is it the fall of a plover's call 
That is answered warily, low yet 

shrill, 
From the sand-heapt mound and the 

rocky ridge ? 
And now o'er the dark plain, so 

wild and wide 
Falls the note of a horn from the old 

drawbridge. 

Who is it that waits at the castle- 
gates ? 
Call in the minstrel, and fill the 

bowl. 
Bid him loose the great music and 

let the song roll. 
Fill the bowl. 
And first, as was due, to the Earl he 

bowed : 
Next to all the Sea-chieftains, blithe 

friends of the Earl's : 
Then advanced through the praise 

of the murmuring crowd, 
And sat down, as they bade him, 

and all his black curls 
Bowed over his harp, as in doubt 

which to choose 
From the melodies coiled at his 

heart. For a man 
O'er some Beauty asleep for one 

moment might muse. 
Half in love, ere he woke her. So 

ere he began, 
He paused over his song. And they 

brought him, the Siiuires, 
A heavy gold cup with the red wine 

ripe in it, 
Then wave over wave of the sweet 

silver wires 
'Gan ripple, and the minstrel took 

heart to begin it. 

A harper that harps through moun- 
tain and glen. 

Wandering, wandering the wide 
world over. 

Sweetest of singers, yet saddest of 
men. 

His soul's lost Lady in vain to dis- 
cover. 



Most fair and most frail of the 

daugliters of men, 
O blest and O curst, tlie man that 

should love her ! 
Who has not loved ? and who has 

not lost '? 
Wherever he wander, the wide world 

over. 
Singing by city, and castle, and 

plain, 
Abiding never, forever a rover. 
Each man that shall hear him will 

swear almost 
In the minstrel's song that his heart 

can discover 
The self-same lady by whom it was 

crost. 
For love is love the wide world over. 

What shall he liken his love unto ? 
Have you seen some cloud the sun 

sets through, 
When the lingering night is close at 

hand ? ' 
Have you seen some rose lie on the 

snow ? 
Or a summer bird in a winter land ? 
Or a lily dying for dearth of dew ? 
Or a pearl sea-cast on a barren 

strand ? 
Some garden never sunshine warms 
Nor any tend ? some lonely tree 
That stretches bleak its barren arms 
Turned inland from the blighting 

sea ? 
Her cheek was pale : her face was 

fair : 
Her heart, he sung, was weak and 

warm ; 
All golden was the sleepy hair 
That floated round about her form, 
And hid the sweetness breathing 

there. 
Her eyes were wild, like stars that 

shine 
Far off in summer nights divine : 
But her smile — it was like the 

golden wine 
Poured into the spirit, as into a cup. 
With passion brimming it up and 

up, 



And marvellous fancies fair and 

fine. 
He took her liair to make sweet 

strings : 
He hid her smile deep in his song. 
This iJiakes so rich the tune he sings 
That o'er the world 'twill linger 

long. 

There is a land far, far away from 

yours. 
And there the stars are thrice as 

bright as these. 
And there the nightingale strange 

music pours 
All day out of the hearts of myrtle- 
trees. 
There the voice of the cuckoo 

sounds never forlorn 
As you hear it far off through the 

deep purple valleys 
And the fire-fly dances by night in 

the corn. 
And the little round owls in the 

long cypress alleys 
Whoop for joy Avhen the moon is 

born. [tree. 

There ripen the olive and the tulip 
And in the sun broadens the green 

prickly pear ; 
And the bright galingales in the 

grass you may see ; 
And the vine, with her royal blue 

globes, dwelleth there. 
Climbing and hanging deliciously 
By every doorway and lone latticed 

chamber. 
Where tlie damsel-fly flits, and the 

heavy brown bee 
Hums alone, and the quick lizzards 

rustle and clamber. 
And all things, there, live and 

rejoice together. 
From the frail peach blossom that 

first appears 
When birds are about in the blue 

summer weather, 
To the oak that has lived through 

his eight hundred years. 
And the castles aie built on the 

hills, not the plains. 



THE EARVS RETURN. 



415 



(And the wild wind-flowers burn 

about in tlie courts there) 
They are white and luulrenched by 

tlie gray winter rains. 
And the swallows, and all things, 

are blithe at their sports 

there. 
O for one moment, at sunset, to 

stand 
Far, far away, in that dear distant 

land 
"Wlience they bore her, — the loveliest 

lady that ever 
Crost the bleak ocean. O, never- 
more, never, 
Shall she stand with her feet in the 

warm dry grasses 
Where the faint balm-heaving breeze 

heavily passes 
And the white lotus-flower leans 

lone on the river. 

Eare were the gems which she had 

for her dower. 
But all the wild-flowers she left 

behind her. 
— A broken heart and a rose-roofed 

bovver. 
O oft, and in many a desolate hour, 
The cold strange faces she sees shall 

remind her 
Of hearts that were warmer, and 

smiles that were kinder, 
Lost, like the roses they plucked 

from her bower ! 
Lonely and far from her own land 

they laid her ! 
— A swallow flew over the sea to 

find her. 
Ah cold, cold and narrow, the bed 

that they made her ! 
The swallow went forth with the 

summer to find her. 
The summer and the swallow came 

back o'er the sea, 
And strange were the tidings the 

bird brought to me. 

And the minstrel sung, and they 
praised and listened, — 

Gazed and praised while the min- 
slrel sung. 



Flushed was each cheek, and each 

fixt eye glistened. 
And husht Avas each voice to the 

minstrers tongue. 
But the Earl grew paler more and 

more 
As the song of the Singer grew 

louder and clearer. 
And so dumb was the hall, you 

might hear the roar 
Of the sea in its pauses grow nearer 

and drearer. 
And . . . hush ! hush ! hush ! 
O was it the wind ? or w as it the 

rush 
Of the restless waters that tumble 

and splash 
On the wild sea-rocks ? or was it 

the crash 
Of stones on the old wet bridge up 

there ? 
Or the sound of the tempest come 

over the main ? 
— Nay, but just now the night was 

fair. 
Was it the march of the midnight 

rain 
Clattering down in the courts ? or 

the crash 
Of armor yonder ? . . . Listen 

again ! 

Can it be lightning? can it be thun- 
der? 

For a light is all round the lurid 
haU 

That reddens and reddens the win- 
dows all. 

And far away you may hear the fall 

As of rafter and bowlder splitting 
asunder. 

It is not the thunder, and it is not 
the lightning 

To which the castle is sounding and 
brightening, 

Bvit something worse than lightning 
or thunder ; 

For what is this that is coming yon- 
der ? 

Which way ? Here ! Where ? 
Call the men ! ... Is it there ? 



4:^ 



THE EARLS RETURiV. 



Call them out ! Ring the bell ! 
Ring the P'iend back to Hell ! 
Ring, ring the alaiuun for mercy ! 

. . . Too late ! 
It has crawled up the walls — it has 

burst in the gate — 
It looks through the windows — it 

creeps near the hall — 
Xear, more near — red and clear — 
It is here ! 
Now the saints save us all ! 

And little, in truth, boots it ringing 

the bell. 
For the fire is loose on its way one 

may tell 
By the hot simmering whispers and 

lunnming up there 
In the oak-beams and rafters. Now 

one of the Squii'es 
His elbow hath thrust through the 

half-smouldered door, — 
Such a hole as some lat for his 

brown wife might bore, — 
And straightway in snaky, white 

wavering spires 
The thin smoke twirls through, and 

spreads eddying in gyres 
Here and there toucht with vanisli- 

ing tints from the glare 
That has swathed in its rose-light 

the sharp turret stair. 
Soon the door ruined thi-ough : and 

in tumbled a cloud 
Of black vapor. And first 'twas all 

blackness, and then 
The quick forke'd fires leapt out 

from their shroud 
In the blackness : and through it 

rushed in the armed men 
From the court-yard. And then 

there was flying and fighting, 
And praying and cursing, — confusion 

confounded. 
Each man, at wild hazard, through 

smoke ramparts smiting, 
Has struck ... is it friend ? is it 

foe ? Who is wounded ? 

Rut the Earl, — who last saw him ? 
Who cares ? who knows ? 



Some one, no doubt, by the weight 

of his blows. 
And they all, at times, heard his 

oath — so they swore: — 
Such a cry as some speared wild 

beast might give vent to 
When the lean dogs are on him, and 

forth M'ith that roar 
Of desolate wrath, the life is sent 

too. 
If he die, he will die with the dying 

about him. 
And his red wet sword in his liand, 

never doubt him : 
If he live, perchance he Avn. bear 

his new bride 
Through them all, past the bridge, 

to the wild seaside. 
And there, whether he leave, or 

keep his wife still. 
There's the free sea round him, new 

lands, and new life still. 

And . . . but ah, the red light there! 

And high up and higher 
The soft, warm, vivid sparkles crowd 

kindling, and wander 
Far away down the breathless blue 

cone of the night. 
Saints ! can it be that the ships are 

on fire, 
Those fierce hot clots of crimson 

light. 
Brightening, -whitening in the 

distance yonder ? 
Slowly over the slumbrous dark 
Up from those fountains of fire spark 

on spark 
(You might count them almost) 

floats silent : and clear 
In the steadfast glow the great cross- 
beams. 
And the sharp and delicate masts 

show black ; 
While wider and higher the red 

light streams, 
And oozes and overflows at the back. 
Then faint through the distance a 

sound you hear. 
And the bare poles totter and dis- 
appear. 



THE EARL'S RETURN. 



417 



Of the Earl, in truth, the Seneschal 

swore 
(And over the ocean this tale he 

ho re) 
That when, as he fled on that last 

wild night, 
He had gained the other side of the 

moat. 
Dripping, he shook off liis wet 

leathern coat, 
And turning round beheld, fi'oni 

basement 
To cope, the castle swathed in light. 
And, revealed in the glare through 

My Lady's casement, 
He saw, or dreamed he saw, this 

sight — 

Two forms (and one for the Earl's he 

knew, 
By the long shaggy beard and the 

broad back too) 
Struggling, grappling, like things half 

human. 
The other, he said, he but vaguely 

distinguished. 
When a sound like the shriek of an 

agonized woman 
Made him shudder, and lo, all the 

vision was gone ! 
Ceiling and floor had fallen through, 
In a glut of vomited flame ex- 
tinguished ; 
And the still Are rose and broadened 

on. 

How fearful a thing is fire ! 
You might make up your mind to die 

by water 
A slow cool death, — nay, at times, 

when weary 
Of pains that pass not, and pleasures 

that pall, 
Wlien the temples throb, and the 

heart is dreary 
And life is dried up, you could even 

desire 
Through the flat green weeds to fall 

and fall 
Half asleep down the green light 

under them all, 
As in a dream, while all things seem 



Wavering, wavering, to feel the 

stream 
Wind, and gurgle, and sound and 

gleam. 
And who would very much fear to 

expire 
By steel, in the front of victorious 

slaughter. 
The blithe battle about him, and 
! conu'ades in call ? 

But to die by fire — 
O that night in the hall ! 

And the castle burned from base to' 
top. 

You had thought that the fire would 
never st- )p. 

For it roared like the great north- 
wind in the pines, 

And shone as the boreal meteor 
shines 

Watched by wild hunters in shuddei'- 
ing bands. 

When wolves are about in the icy 
lands. 

From the sea you might mark for a 
space of three days. 

Or fainter or fiercer, tlie dull red 
blaze. 

And when this ceased, the smoke 
above it 

Hung so heavy not even the wind 
seemed to move it ; 

So it glared and groaned, and night 
after night 

Smouldered, — a terrible beacon- 
light. 

Now the Earl's old minstrel, — he 

that had sung 
His youth out in those halls, — the 

man beloved. [tongue, 

With the silver hair and the golden 
They bore him out from the fire ; but 

he roved 
Back to the stifled courts ; and there 
They watched him hovering, day 

after day. 
To and fro, with his long white hair 
And his gold harp, chanting a lonely 

lay ; 



r 



4i8 



A sours LOSS. 



Chanting and changing it o'er and 

o'er, 
Like the mournful mad melodious 

brealh 
Of some wild swan singing himself to 

death. 
As he floats down a strange land 

leagues away. 
One day" the song ceased. They 

heard it no more. 

Did you ever an Alpine eagle see 
Come down from flying near the sun 
To tind his eyrie all undone 
On lonely cliffs where chance hath 

led 
Some spying tliief the brood to 

plunder ? 
How hangs he desolate overhead, 
And circling now aloft, now under, | 
His ruined home screams round and j 

round, j 

Then drops flat fluttering to the 

ground. ' 

So moaning round the roofs they saw ' 

liim, j 

With his gleaming harp and his 

vesture while : [ing i 

Going, and coming, and ever return- 
To those chambers, emptied of beauty 

and state 
And checked with blackness and 

ruin and burning ; 



Then, as some instinct seemed to 

draw him, 
Like hidden hands down to his fate, 
He paused, plunged, dropped forevt-r 

f i-om sight ; 
And a cone of smoke and sparkles 

rolled up, 
As out of some troubled crater-cup. 

As for the rest, some died ; some 

fled 
Over the sea, nor ever returned. 
But until to the living return the 

dead, 
And they each shall stand and take 

their station 
Again at the last great conflagration, 
Never moi'e will be seen the Earl or 

the stranger. 
No doubt there is much here that's 

flt to be burned. 
Christ save us all in that day from 

the danger ! 
And this is why these fishermen say, 
Sitting alone in their boats on the 

bay, 
When the moon is low in the wild 

windy nights, 
They hear strange sounds, and see 

strange sights. 
Spectres gathering all forlorn 
Under the boughs of this bare black 

tliorn. 



A SOUL'S LOSS. 



" If Beaut}' have a soul this is not she." — Troilus and Cressida. 



'TwixT the Future and the Past 
There's a moment. It is o'er. 

Kiss sad hands ! we part at last. 
lam on tlie other shore. 

Fly, stern Hour ! and hasten fast. 
Nobler things are gone before. 

From the dark of dying years 

Grows a face with violet eyes, 
Tremulous through tender tears, — 



Warm lips heavy with rich sighs, — 
Ah, they fade ! it disappears, 
And with it my whole heart dies ! 

Dies . . . and this choked world is 
sickening ; 
Truth has nowhere room for breath. 
Crusts of falsehood, slowly thicken- 
ing 
From tlie rottenness beneath 



A SOUL'S LOSS. 



419 



These rank social forms, are quick- 
ening 
To a loatiisonie life-in-death. 

those devil's market-places ! 
Knowing, nightly, she Ava there, 

Can I marvel that the traces 
On her spirit are not fair ? 

1 forgot that air debases 

When 1 knew she breathed such 
air. 

This a fair immortal spirit 

For which God prepared his 
spheres ? 
What ! shall this the stars inherit ? 

And the worth of honest tears ? 
A fool's fancy all its mirtlil 

A fool's judgment all its fears ! 

No, she loves no other ! N"o, 
That is lost which she gave me. 

Is this comfort. — that I know 
All her spirit's poverty ? 

When that dry soul is drained low, 
His Avho wills the dregs may be ! 

Peace ! I trust a heart forlorn 
Weakly upon boisterous speech. 

Pity were more tit t: an scorn. 

Fingered moth, and bloomless 
peach ! 

Gathered rose withoiit a thorn, 
Set to fleer in all men's reach ! 

I am clothed with lier disgrace. 

O her shame lias made ray own ! 
O I reel fi-om my high place ! 

All belief is overthrown. 
What ! This whirligig of lace, 

This is the Queen that I have 
known ? 

Starry Queen that did confer 
Beauty on the barren earth ! 

Woodlands, wandered oft with her 
In her sadness and her mirth, 

Feeling her ripe influence stir 
Brought the violets to bii'th. 



The great golden clouds of even, 
They, too, knew her, and the 
host 

Of the eternal stars in heaven ; 
And I deemed I knew he most. 

I, to whom the AYord was given 
How" archangels have been lost ! 

Given in vain I . . . But all is over ! 

Every spell that bound me broken I 
In her eyes I can discover 

Of til it perisht soul no token. 
I can neither hate nor love her. 

All my loss must be uTispoken. 

Mourn I may, that from her features 
All the angel light is gone. 

But I chide not. Human creatures 
Are not angels. Slie was none. 

Women have so many natures I 
I think she loved me well with 
one. 

All is not with love departed. 

Life remains, though toueht with 
scorn. 
Lonely, but not broken-hearted. 

Nature changes not. The morn 
Breathes not sadder. Buds have 
started 
To white clusters on the thorn. 

And to-morow I shall see 
How the leaves their green leaves 
sheath 
Have burst upon the chestnut-tree. 
And the white rose-bush beneath 
My lattice which, once tending, she 
Made thrice sweeter with her 
breath. 

Its black buds through moss and 
glue 
Will swell greener. And at eve 
Winking bats will waver through 
The gray warmth from eave to 
eave, 
While the daisy gathers dew. 

These things grieve not, though \ 
grieve. 



4^0 



A SOUVS LOSS. 



Wliat of that ? Deep Nature's glad- 
ness 
Does not help this grief to less. 
And the stars will show no sadness, 

And the llovvers no heaviness, 
Though each thought should turn to 
madness 
'Neath the strain of its distress ! 

No, if life seem lone to me, 

'Tis scarce lonelier that at first. 

Lonely natures there must he. 
Eagles are so. I was nurst 

Far f ronr love in infancy : 
I have sought to slake my thirst 

At high founts ; to fly alone. 

Haunt the heaven, and soar, aiul 
sing. 
Earth's warm joys I have not 
known. 
This one heart held everything. 
Now my eyrie is o'erthroM'u ! 
As of old, 1 spread the wing, 

And rise up to meet my fate 
With a yet unbroken will. 

When Heaven shut up Eden-gate, 
Man was given the earth to till. 

There's a world to cultivate. 
And a solitude to fill. 

Welcome man's old helpmate. Toil ! 
How may this heart's hurt be 
healed '* 
Crush the olive into oil ; 
Turn the ploughshare ; sow the 
field. 
All are tillers of the soil. 
Each some harvest hopes to yield. 

Shall I perish with the whole 
Of the coming years in view 

Unattempted ? To the soul 

Every hour brings something new. 

Still suns rise : still ages roll. 
Still some deed is left to do. 

Some . . . but what ? Small matter 
now ! 
For one lily for her hair, 



For one rose to wreathe her brow, 
For one gem to sparkle there, 

I had . . . words, old words, I know! 
What was I, that she should care 

How I differed from the connnon 
Crowd that thrills not to her 
touch ? 
How 1 deemed her more than 
human, 
And had died to crown her such ? 
They ? To them she is mere 
woman. 
O, her loss and mine is much ! 

Fool, she haimts me still ! No 
wonder ! 

Not a bud on yon black bed, 
Not a swated lily yonder, 

But recalls some fragrance fled ! 
Here, what marvel I should ponder 

On the last word which she said ? 

I must seek some other place 
Where free Nature knows her not: 

AVhere I shall not meet her face 
In each old familiar spot. 

There is comfort left in space. 
Even this grief may be forgot. 

Great men reach dead hands unto 
me 
From the graves to comfort me. 
Shakspeare's heart is throbbing 
through me. 
All man has been man may be. 
Plato speaks like one that knew 
me. 
Life is made Philosophy. 

Ah, no, no ! while yet the leaf 
Turns, the truth upon its pall. 

By the stature of this grief. 
Even Shakspeare shows so small ! 

Plato palters with relief. 
Grief is greater than them all ! 

They were pedants who could speak. 
Grander souls have passed un- 
heard ; 



THE ARTIST. 



42 Z 



Such as found all language weak ; 

Choosing rather to record 
Secrets before Heaven : nor break 

Faith with angels by a word. 

And Heaven heeds this wretched- 
ness 

Which I suffer. Let it be. 
Would that I could love thee less ! 

I, too, am dragged down by thee. 



Thine — in weakness — thine — ah yes ! 
Yet farewell eternally. 

Child, I have no lips to chide thee. 

Take the blessing of a heart 
(Never more to beat beside thee !) 

Which in blessing breaks. De- 
part. 
Farewell. I that deified thee 

Dare not question what thou art. 



THE ARTIST. 



O Aktist, range not over-wide : 
Lest what thou seek be haply hid 

Jn bramble blossoms at thy side, 
Or shut within the daisy-lid. 

God's glory lies not out of reach. 
Tlie moss we crush beneath our 
feet, 
The pebbles on the wet sea-beach, 
Have solemn meanings strange and 
sweet. 

The peasant at liis cottage door 
May teach thee more than Plato 
knew : 

See (hat thou scorn him not : adore 
God in him, and thy nature too. 

Know well thy friends. The wood- 
bine's breath. 

The woolly tendril on the vine, 
Are more to thee than Cato's death. 

Or Cicero's words to Catiline. 

The wild rose is thy next in blood : 
Share Nature with her, and thy 
heart. 

The kingcups are thy sisterhood : 
Consult them duly on thine art. 

Nor cross the sea for gems. Nor 

seek : 
Be sought. Fear not to dwell 

}ilone. 



Possess thyself. Be proudly meek. 
See thou be worthy to be known. 

The Genius on thy daily ways 
Shall meet, and take thee by the 
hand : 

But serve him not as who obeys : 
He is thy slave if thou command : 

And blossoms on the blackberry- 
stalks 

He shall enchant as thou dost pass, 
Till they drop gold upon thy walks, 

And diamonds in the dewy grass. 

Sttch largess of the liberal bowers 
From left to right is grandly flung, 

What time their subject blooms and 
flowers 
King-Poets walk in state among. 

Be quiet. Take things as they come ; 
Each hour will draw out some sur* 
prise. 
With blessing let the days go home : 
Thou Shalt liave thanks from even- 
ing skies. 

Lean not on one mind constantly : 
Lest, where one stood before, two 
fall. 

Something God hath to say to thee 
Worth hearing from the lips of all, 



42: 



THE ARTIST. 



All things are thine estate : yet must 

Thou first display the title-deeds, 
And sue the world. Be strong : and 
trust 
High instincts more than all the 
" creeds. 

The world of Thought is packed so 
tight, 
If thou stand up another tumhles : 
Heed it not, though thou have to 
fight 
With giants ; whoso follows 
stumbles. 

Assert thyself : and by and by 
The world will come and lean on 
thee. 
But seek not praise of men : thereby 
Shall false shows cheat thee. 
Boldly be. 

Each man Avas worthy at the first : 
God spake to us ere we wei'e born : 

But we forget. The land is curst : 
We plant the brier, reap the thorn. 

Remember, every man He made 

Is diffei'ent : has some deed to do, 
Some work to work. Be undis- 
mayed, 
Though thine be humble : do it 
too. 

Not all the wisdom of the schools 
Is wise for thee. Hast thou to 
speak ? 

No man hath spoken for thee. Rules 
Are well : but never fear to break 

The scaffolding of other souls : 
It was not meant for thee to mount ; 

Though it may serve thee. Separate 
wholes 
Make up the sum of God's account. 

Earth's number-scale is near us set ; 

Tlie total God alone can see ; 
But each some fraction : shall I fret 

If YOU see Four where I saw 
'Three ? 



A unit's loss the sum would mar ; 

Therefore if I have One or Two, 
I am as rich as others are, 

And help the whole as well as you. 

This wild white rosebud in my hand 

Hath .meanings meant for me 

alone. 

Which no one else can understand : 

To you it breathe with altered 

tone : 

How shall I class its properties 
For you ? or its wise whisperings 

Interpret ? Other ears and eyes 
It teaches many other things. 

We number daisies, fringe and star : 
We count the cincifoils and the 
poppies : 
We know not what they mean. We 
are 
Degenerate copyists of copies. 

We go to Nature, not as lords, 
But servants : and she treats us 
thus : 

Speaks to us Avith indifferent words-, 
And from a distance looks at us. 

Let us go boldly, as M-e ought. 
And say to her, " We are a part 

Of that supreme original Thought 
AVhich did conceive thee what thou 
art : 

" We will not have this lofty look : 
Thou shall fall down, and recog- 
nize 
Thy kings : we ■will write in thy 
book, 
Conmiand thee with our eyes." 

She hath usurpt us. She should be 
Our model ; but we have become 

Her miniature-painters. So when 
we 
Entreat her softly she is dumb. 

Nor serve the subject overmuch : 
Nor rhythm and rhyme, nor color 
and form. 



THE ARTIST. 



423 



Know trulli liath all great graces, 
such 
As shall with these thy work in- 
form. 

We ransack History's tattered page: 
We prate of epocli and coslunie : 

Call this, and that, the Classic Age : 
Choose tunic now, now helm and 
plume : 

But while we halt in weak debate 
'Twixt that and this appropriate 
theme. 
The offended wild-flowers stare and 
wait, 
The bird hoots at us from the 
stream. 

Next, as to laws. Wliat's beautiful 
We recognize in form and face : 

And judge it thus, and thus, by rule. 
As perfect law brings perfect grace : 

If through the effect we drag the 
cause. 

Dissect, divide, anatomize, 
Results are lost in loathsome laws. 

And all the ancient beauty dies : 

Till we, instead of bloom and light, 
See only sinews, nerves, and veins: 

Nor will {he effect and cause unite. 
For one is lost if one remains : 

But from some higher point behold 
This dense, perplexing complica- 
tion ; 

And laws involved in laws unfold. 
And orb into thy contemplation. 

God, when he made the seed, con- 
ceived 
The flower ; and all the work of 
sun 
And rain, before the stem was leaved, 
In that prenatal thought was done; 

The girl who twines in her soft hair 
The orange-flower, with love's 
devotion, 



By the mere act of being fuir 
Sets countless laws of lite in mo- 
lion ; 

So thou, by one thought thoroughly 
great, 
Shalt, without heed thereto, fulfil 
All laws of art. Create ! create ! 
Dissection leaves the dead dead 
still. 

All Sciences are brandies, each, 
Of that flrst science, — Wisdom. 
Seize 
The true point whence, if thou 
shouldst reach 
Thine arm out, thou may'st grasp 
all these. 

And close all knowledge in thy palm. 

As History proves Philosophy : 
Philosophy, with warnings calm. 

Prophet-like, guiding History. 

Burn catalogues. Write thine own 
books. 
What need to pore o'er Greece and 
Rome ? 
When whoso through his own life 
looks 
Shall And that he is fully come. 

Through Greece and Rome, and 
Middle- Age : 
Hath been by turns, ere yet full- 
grown. 
Soldier, and Senator, and Sage, 
And worn the tunic and the gown. 

Cut the world thoroughly to the 

heart. 

The sweet and bitter kernel crack. 

Have no half-dealings with thine art. 

All heaven is waiting : turn not 

back. 

If all the woi-ld for thoe and me 
One sfditary sliape jxissessed, 

What shall I say ? a single tree — 
Whereby to type and hint the rest, 




And I could imitate Iho bark 

And foliage, both in form and hue, 

Or silvery-gray, or brown and dark, 
Or rongh with moss, or wet witli 
dew, 

But thou, with one form in tbine 

Couldst penetrate all forms : 
possess 
The soul of form : and multiply 
A million like it, more or less, — 

Which were the Artist of us twain ? 

The moral's clear to xmderstand. 
Wbere'er we walk, by hill or plain. 

Is there no mystei'y on the land ? 

The osiei'cd, oozy water, rufiled 
By fluttering swifts that dip and 
wink : 

Deep cattle in the cowslips mulHed, 
Or lazy-eyed upon the brink : 



Or, when — a scroll of stars — the 
night [away, 

(By God withdrawn) is rolled 
The silent sun, on some cold height, 

Breaking the great seal of the day: 

Are these not words more rich than 

ours ? 

O seize their import if you can ! 

Our souls are parched like withering 

flowers, [gan. 

Our knowledge ends where it be- 

Wbile yet about us fall God's dews. 
And whisper secrets o'er the earth 

Worth all the weary years we lose 
In learning legends of our birth, 

Arise, O Artist ! and restore 

Their music to the moaning winds, 
Love's broken jiearls to life's bare 
shore. 
And freshness to our faintii;g 
minds. 



THE WIFE'S TRAGEDY. 



THE EVENING BEFORE THE 
FLIGHT. 

Take the diamonds from my hair I 
Take the flowers from the urn ! 

Fling the lattice wide ! more air ! 
Air — more air, or else 1 burn ! 

Put the l)racelets by. And thrust 
Out of sight these hated pearls, 

I could trample them to dust. 
Though they were his gift, the 
Earl's ! 

Flusht I am ? The dance it was. 

Only that. Now leave me. Sweet. 
Take the flowei's, Love, because 

They will wither in this heat. 



Good-night, dearest ! Leave the 
door 
Half-way open as you go. 
— O, thank God? . . . Alone once 
more. 
Am I dreaming? . . . Dream- 
ing ? . . . no ! 



Still that music underneath 
Works to madness in my brain. 

Even the roses seem to bi'eathe 
Poisoned perfumes, full of pain. 



Let me think . . . my head is ach- 
ing. 

I have little strength to think. 
And I know my heart is breaking. 

Yet, O love, I will not shrink ! 



THE WIFE'S TRAGEDY. 



425 



In his look was sucli sweet sadness. 

And he fixed that look on nie. 
I was helpless . . . call it madness, 

Call it guilt . . . but it must be. 

I can bear it, if, in losing 
All things else, I lose him not. 

All the grief is mj' own choosing. 
Can 1 murmur at my lot '? 

Ah, the night is bright and still 
Over all the fields I know. 

And the chestnuts on the hill : 
And the quiet lake below. 

By that lake I yet remember 

How, last year, we stood together 

One wild eve in warm Septemijei' 
Bright with thunder: not a feather 

Stirred the sknnbrous swans that 
floated 
Past the reed-beds, husht and 
white : 
Towers of sultry cloud hung moated 
In the lake's unshaken light : 

Far behind us all the extensive 
Woodland blackened against heav- 
en : [sive : 

And we spoke not : — pausing pen- 
Till the thunder-cloud was riven, 

And the black wood whitened under. 
And the storm began to roll. 

And the love laid up like thunder 
Burst at once upon my soul. 

There ! . . . the moon is just in 

crescent 
. In the silent happy sky. 
And to-night the meanest peasant 
lu her light's more blest than I. 

Other moons I soon shall see 
Over Asian headlands green : 

Ocean-spaces sparkling free 
Isles of breathless balm between. 

And the rosy-rising star 

At the setting of the day 
From the distant sandy bar 

Shining over Africa ; 



Steering through the glowing wea- 
tlier 
Past tlui tracks of ci'imson light, 
Down the sunset lost together 
Far athwart the summer night. 

"Canst thou make such life thy 
choice. 

My heart's own, my chosen one ? " 
So he whispered and his voice 

Had such magic in its tone I j 

But one hour ago we parted. 1 

And we meet again to-morrow. ; 

Parted — silent, and sad-hearted : ; 

And we meet — in guilt and sor- : 
row. 

But we shall meet . „ . meet.O God, \ 

To part never . . . the last time ! , 

Yes ! the Ordeal shall be trod. j 

Burning ploughshares — love and \ 

crime. > 

O with him, with him to wander ; 

Through the wide world — only \ 

his ! . 



Heart and hope and heaven to 
squander 
On the wild wealth of his kiss ! 

Thefl ? . . . like these poor flowers 
that wither 

In my bosom, to be thrown 
Lightly from him any whither 

When the sweetness all is flown ? 

O, I know it all, my fate ! 

But the gulf is crost forever. 
And regret is born too late. 

The siiut Past reopens never. 

Fear ? . . . I caimot fear ! for fear 
Dies with hope in every breast. 

O, I see the frozen sneer. 
Careless smile, and callous jest ! 

Ev.t myshame shall yet be worn 
Like the purple of a Queen. 

I can answer scorn wilh scorn. 
Fool ! I know not what J liieaHf 



426 



THE WIPES TRAGEDY. 



Yet beneath his smile (hU smile !) 
Smiles less kind [ shall not see. 

Let the whole wide world revile. 
He is all the world to me. 

So to-night all hopes, all fears, 
All tlie bright and brief array 

Of my lost youth's happier years, 
AVith these gems I put away. • 

Gone ! . . . so . . . one by one . . . 
all gone ! 

Not one jewel I retain. 
Of my life's wealth. All alone 

I tread boldly o'er my pain. 

On to him . . . Ah, me ! my child — 
My own fair-haired, darling boy! 

In his sleep just now he smiled. 
All his dreams are dreams of joy. 

How those soft long lashes shade 
That young cheek so husht and 
wai-m, 

Like a half-blown rosebnd laid 
On the little dimpled arm ! 

He will wake without a mother. 

He will hate me when he hears 
From the cold lips of another 

All n)y faults in after years. 

None will tell the deep devotion 
Wberewith I have brooded o'er 

His young life, since its first motion 
Made me hope and pray once 
more. 

On my breast he smiled and slept, 
Smiled between my wrongs and 
me. 

Till the weak warm tears I wept 
Set my dry, coiled nature free. 

Nay, . . . my feverish kiss would 
Avake him. 
How can I dare bless his -sleep ? 
They Avill change him soon, and 
make him 
Like themselves that never weep ; 



Fitted to the world's bad part : 
Yet, with all their wealth afford 
him 
Alight more rich than this lost 
heart 
Whose last anguish yearns toward 
him ? 

Ah, there's none will love him then 
As I love that leave him now! 

He will mix with selfish men. 
Yes, he has his father's browl 

Lie thou there, thou poor rose- 
blossom. 

In that little hand more light 
Than upon this restless bosom, 

AVhose last gift is given to-night. 

God forgive mo ! — My God, cherish 

His lone motherless infancy ! 
Would tonight that I might perish ! 
- But heaven will not let me die. 

O love ! love ! but this is bitter! 

O tbat we had never met ! 
O but hate than love were fitter I 

And he too may hate me yet. 

Yet to him have I not given 
All life's sweetness? . . . fame •? 
and name ? 

Hope ? and happiness ? and heaven? 
Can he hate me for my shame ? 

"Child," he said, "thy life was 
glad 

In the dawning of its years ; 
And love's morn should be less sad> 

For his eve may close in tears. 

" Sweet in novel lands," he said, 
*' Day by day to share delight ; 

On by soft surprises led, 
And together rest at night. 

" We will see the shores of Greece, 
And the temples of the Nile : 

Sail wbere summer suns increase 
Toward the south from isle to isle. 



THE W/FE'S TRAGEDY. 



427 



" Track the first star that swims on 
(blowing depths toward night and 
us, 

While tlie heats of sunset crimson 
All the purple Bosphorus. 

" Leaning o'er some dark ship-side, 
Watch tlie wane of mighty moons; 

Or tlirough starlit Venice glide, 
Singing down the blue lagoons. 

" So from coast to coast we'll range, 
Growing nearer as we move 

On our charmed way ; each soft 
change 
Only deepening changeless love.'' 

'Twas the dream which I, too, 
dreamed 

Once, long since, in days of yore. 
Life's long-faded fancies seemed 

At his words to bloom once more. 

The old hope, the wreckt belief, 
The lost light of vanisht years, 

Ere my heart was worn witli grief. 
Or my eyes were dimmed with 
tears ! 

When, a careless girl, I clung 
With proud trust to my own pow- 
ers ; 

Ah, long since I, too, was j'oung, 
I, too, dreamed of happier hours ! 

Whether this may yet be so 
(Truth or dream) I cannot tell. 

But where'er his footsteps go 
Turns my heart, I feel too well. 

Ha ! the long night wears away. 

Yon cold drowsy star grows dim. 
The long-feared, long-wisht-for day 

Comes, when I shall fly with him. 

In the laurel wakes the thrush. 

Through these dreaming chambers 
wide 
Not a sound is stirring. Hush ; 

— O, it was my child that cried ! 



IL 

THE PORTRAIT. 



Yes, 



'tis she ! Those eyes t that 

hair 

With the self-same wondrous hue! 
And that smile — which was so fair, 
Is it strange I deemed it true ? 

Years, yeai-s, years I have not drawn 
Back this curtain ! there she 
stands 

By the terrace on the lawn. 
With the white rose iii her hands ! 

And about her the armorial 
Scutcheons of a haughty race, 

Graven each with its memorial 
Of tlie old Lords of the Place. 

You, who do profess to see 
In the face the written mind. 

Look in that face, and tell me 
In what part of it you find 

All the falsehood, and the wrong, 
And the sin, which must have 
been 

Hid in baleful beauty long, 
Like the worm that lurks unseen. 

In the shut heart of the flower. 

'Tis the Sex, no doubt ! And still 
Some may lack the means, the power, 

There's not one that lacks the will. 

Their own way they seek the Devil, 

Ever prone to the deceiver ! 
If too deep I feel this evil 
And this shame, may God forgive 
her ! 

For I loved her, — loved, ay, loved 
her 

As a man just once may love. 
I so trusted, so approved her, 

Set her, blindly, so above 



This 



world which was about 



poor 
her I 

And (so loving her) because, 
With a faith too high to doubt her, 
I, forsooth, but seldom was 



-1 



428 



THE WIFE'S TRAGEDY. 



At her feet with clamorous praises 
And protested tenderness 

(These things some laen can do), 
phrases 
On her face, perhaps her dress, 

Or the flower she. chose to braid 
In lier hair, — because, you see. 

Thinking love's best pi'oved unsaid, 
And by words Ihe dignity 

Of true feeling's often lost, 
I was vowed to life's broad duty ; 

Man's great Inisiness uppermost 
In my mind, not woman's beauty; 

Toiling still to win for her 
Honor, fortune, state in life. 

(" Too much with the Minister, 
And too little with the wife !") 

Just for this, she flung aside 

All my toil, my heart, my name ; 

Trampled on my ancient ])ride. 
Turned my honor into shame. 

O. if this old coronet 

Weighed too hard on her young 
brow. 
Need she thus dishonor it, 

Fling it in the dust so low ? 

But 'tis just these women's way, — 
All the same the wide world over ! 

Fooled by what's most worthless, 
they 
Cheat in turn the honest lover. 

And I was not. I thank heaven, 
Made, as some, to read them 
through ; 

Were life three times longer even, 
There are better things to do. 

No ! to let a woman lie 
Like a canker, at the roots 

Of a man's life, — burn it dry. 
Nil) the blossom, stunt the fruits, 

This I count both shame and thrall! 

Who is free to let one creature 
Come between himself, and all 

The true process of his nature, 



Wliile across the world Ihe nations 
Call to us that we should share 

In their griefs, their exultations ? — 
All they will be, all they are ! 

And so much yet to be done, — 
Wrong to root out, good to 
strengthen ! 

Such hard battles to be won ! 
Such long glories yet to lengthen ! 

'Mid all these, how small one grief, — 
One wrecked heart, whose hopes 
are o'er ! 

For myself I scorn relief. 
For the people I claim more. 

Strange ! these crowds whose in- 
stincts guide them 

Fail to get tlie thing they would, 
Till we nobles stand beside them. 

Give our names, or shed our blood. 

From of old this hath been so. 

For we too were with the first 
In the light fought long ago 

When" the chain of Charles was 
burst. 

Who but we set Freedom's border 
Wrenched at Runnymede from 
John ? 
Who but we stand, towers of order, 
'Twixt the red cap and the 
throne ? 

And they wrong us, England's Peers, 
Us, the vanguard of the land. 

Who should say the march of years 
Makes us shrink at Truth's right 
hand. 

'Mid the armies of Reform, 
To the People's cause allied. 

We — the forces of the storm ! 
We — the planets of the tide ! 

Do I seem too much to fret 
At my own peculiar woe ? 

WoiUd to heaven I could forget 
How I loved her long ago j 



THE IVTPE'S TRAGEDY. 



429 



As a father loves a child, 
So I loved her : — rather thus 

Than as youth loves, when our wild 
New-found passions master us. 

And— for I was proud of old 
('Tis my nature) — doubtless she 

In the man so calm, so cold. 
All the lieart's warmth could not 
see. 

Nay, I blame myself — nor lightly, 
Whose chief duty was to guide 

Her young careless life more rightly 
Through tlie perils at her side. 

Ah, but love is blind ! and I 
Loved her blindly, blindly ! . . . 

Well, ^ 

Who that ere loved trustfully 
Such strange danger could fore- 
tell ? 

As some consecrated cup 
On its saintly shrine secure. 

All my life seemed lifted up 
On that heart I deemed so pure. 

Well, for me there yet remains 
Labor— that's much ; then, the 
state : 

And, what pays a thousand pains, 
Sense of I'ight and scorn of fate. 



. . my own brave 



And, O, more ! 
boy, 

W^ith his frank and eager brow, 
And his hearty innoccnt'joy. 

For as yet he does not know 

All the wrong his mother did. 

Would that this might pass un- 
known ! 
For his young years God forbid 

I should darken by my own. 

Yet this must come . . . but I mean 
He shall be, as time moves on, 

All his mother might have been, 
Comfort, counsel— both in one. 



Doubtless, first, in that which moved 
me 
Man's strong natural wrath had 
part. 
Wronged by one I deemed had 
loved me. 
For I loved her from my heart ! 

But that's past ! If I was «!ore 
To the heart, and bliiul with 
shame, 

I see calmly now. Nay, more, — 
For I pity where I blame. 

For, if he betray or grieve her, 
What is her's to tiu'n to still ? 

And at last, when he shall leave 
her, 
As at last he surely will. 

Where shall she find refuge ? what 
That worst widowhood can 
soothe ? 

For the Past consoles her not. 
Nor the memories of her youth. 

Neither that which in the dust 
She hath flung, — the name she 
bore ; 

But with her own shame she must 
Dwell forsaken evermore. 

Nothing left but years of anguish. 
And remoi-se but not return : 

Of her own self-hate to languish : 
For her long-lost peace to yearn : 

Or, yet worse beyond all measure. 
Starting from wild reveries, 

Drain the poison misnamed Pleas- 
ure, 
And laugh drunken on the lees. 

O false heart ! O woman, woman. 
Woman ! would thy ti-eachery 

Had been less ! For surely no man 
Better loved than I loved thee. 

We must never meet again. 

Even shouldst thou repent the 
past. 
Both must suffer : both feel paiu : 

Ere God pardon both at last. 



43° 



THE WIPES TRAGEDY. 



Farewell, thou falso face ! Life 
speeds me 

Oil ils duties. I must figlit : 
I must toil. The People needs me : 

Aud I speak for them to-night. 



III. 
THE LAST INTERVIEW. 

Thanks, Dear ! Put the lamp 
down ... so, 
For my eyes are weak and dim. 
How the shadows come and go ! 
Speak trutli, — have they sent for 
him ? 

Yes, thank Heaven ! And he will 
come, 

Come and watch my dying hour, — 
Though I left and shamed his home. 

— I am withered like this flower 

Wliich he gave me long ago. 

'Twas upon my bridal eve, 
When I swoi'c to love him so 

As a wife should — smile or grieve 

With liim, for him — and not slirink. 

And now ? . . . O the long, long 
pain ! 
See this sunken clieek ! You think 

He would know my face again ? 

All its wretched beauty gone ! 

Only the deep care survives. 
Ah, could years of grief atone 

For those fatal hours! ... It 
drives 

Past the pane, the bitter blast ! 

In this garret one might freeze. 
Hark there ! wheels below! At last 

He is come then ? No . . . the 
trees 

And the night-wind — nothing more ! 

Set the chair for him to sit, 
When he comes. And close the 
door, 

For the gust blows cold through it. 



When I thhik, I can remember 
I was born in castle-halls, — 

How yon dull and dying ember 
Glares against the whitewasht 
walls \ 

If he come not (but you said 

That the messenger was sent 
Long suice '?) Tell him when I'm 
dead 
How my life's last hours were 
speut 

In repenting that life's sih. 

And . . . the room grows strangely 
dark ! 
See, the i-ain is oozing in. 

Set the lamp dowu nearer. Hark, 

Footsteps, footsteps on the stairs ! 

Jll8 . . . no, no ! 'twas nut the 
wind. 
God, I know, has heard my prayers. 

We shall meet. I am resigned. 

Prop me up upon the pillows. 

Will he come to my bedside ? 
Once 'twas his . . . Among the 
Avillows 

How the water seems to glide ! 

Past the woods, the farms, the tow- 
ers. 
It seems gliding, gliding through. 
^''Dearest, i<ee, these young June- 
flowers, 
I have pluckt them all for you, 

" Here, where passed my boyhood 
mitsinr/ 
On the bride which I might wed." 
Ah, it goes now! I am losing 
All tilings. What was that he 
said ? 



Say, where am I ? 
room ? 



This strange 



THE EAKL. 



Gertrude ! 



THE WIFE'S TRAGEDY. 



431 



GERTRUDE. 

All, his voice ! I knew it 
But tins place ? ... Is this the 
tomb, 
With the cold dews ci'eeping 
through it ? 

THE EAEL. 

Gertrude ! Gertrude ! 

GERTRUDE. 

Will you Stand 
Near me ? Sit down. ' Do not 
stir. 
Tell me, may I take your hand ? 
Tell me, will you look on her 

Wlio so wronged you ? I have wept 

such tears for that sin's sake ! 
And that thought has never slept, — 

But it lies here, like a snake, 

In my bosom, — gnawing, gnawing 
All my life up ! I had meant, 

Could I live yet . . . Death is draw- 
ing 
Near me — 

THE EARL. 

God, thy pimishment ! 
Dare I judge her ? — 

GERTRUDE. 

O, believe me, 
'Twas a dream, a hideous dream. 
And I wake now. Do not leave me. 

1 am dying. All things seem 

Failing from me — even my breath! 

But my sentence is from old. 
Sin came first upon me. Death 

Follows sin, soon, soon ! Behold, 

Dying thus ! Ah, why didst leave 
Lonely Love's lost bridal bowers 

Where I found the snake, like Eve, 
Unsuspected 'mid the flowers ? 

Had I been some poor man's bride, 
I had shared with love his lot : 



Labored truly by his side. 
And made glad his lowly cot. 

I had been content to mate 

Love with labor's sunburnt brows. 

But to be a thing of state, — 
Homeless in a husband's house ! 

In the gorgeous game — the strife 
For the dazzling ijrize — that moved 
you— 
Love seemed crowded out of life — 

THE EARL. 

Ah fool ! and I loved you, loved 



you 



GERTRUDE. 



Yes. I see it all at last — 

All in ruins. I can dare 
To gaze down o'er my lost past 

From these heights of my despair. 

0, when all seemed grown most 
drear — 

I was weak — I cannot tell — 
But the serpent in my ear 

Whispered, whispered — and I fell. 

Lood around now. Does it cheer 
you. 
This strange place ? the wasted 
frame 
Of the dying woman near you, 
Weighed into her grave by shame? 

Can you trace in this wan form 
Aught resembling that young 

girl's 
Whom you loved once ? See, this 

arm — 
■ Shrunken, shrunken! And my 

curls, 

Tliey have cut them all away. 

And my brows are worn with woe. 
Would j'ou, looking at me, say. 

She was lovely long ago ? 

Husband, answer ! in all these 
Are you not avenged ? If I 



432 



The WIFE'S TRAGEDY. 



Could rise now, upon my knees, 
At your feet, before 1 die, 

I would fall down in my sorrow 
And my shame, and say " for- 
give," 

Tliat which will be dust to-morrow. 
This weak clay ! 

THE EARL. 

Poor sufferer, live. 

God forgives. Shall I not so ? 

gektrude! 

Nay, a better life, in trutli, 
1 do iiope for. Xot below. 
Partner of my perisht youth. 

Husband, wronged one I Let your 
blessing 
Be M-ith me, before, to-night, 
From the life that's past redressing 
This straved soul must take its 
flight"! 

Tears, warm tears ! I feel them 
creep 
Down my cheek. Tears — not my 
own. * 

It is long since I could weep. 
Past all tears my grief hath grown. 

Over this dry withered cheek. 
Drop by drop, I feel them fall. 

But my voice is growing weak ; 
And I haye not spoken all. 

I had much to say. My son, 
My lost child that never knew me ! 

Is he liUe me ? One by one. 
All his little ways come to me. 

Is he grown ? I fancy him ! 

Hovv that cliildish face comes 
back 
O'er my memory sweet and dim ! 

And his long hair ? Is it black ? 

Or as mine was once ? His mother 

Did he ever ask to see ? 
Has he grown to love another — 

Some strange woman not like me ? 



Would he shudder to behold 
This pale face and faded form 

If he knew, in days of old. 
How he slumbered on my arm ! 

How I nurst him ? loved him ? 
missed him 

All this long heartbroken time ? 
It is years since last I kissed him. 

Does he hate me for my crime ? 

I liad meaiit to send some token — 
If, indeed, I dared to send it. 

Tliis old chain — the links are 
broken — 
Like my life — I could not mend it. 

Husband, husband ! I am dying, 
Dying ! Let me feel your kiss 

On my brow where I am lying. 
You are great enough for this ! 

And you'll lay me, when I'm gone, 
— Not in those old sculptured 
Avails ! 

Let no name be carved — no stone — 
No ancestral funerals ! 

In some little grave of grass 
Anywhere, you'll let me lie : 

Where the niglit-wiuds only pass, 
Or the clouds go floating by ; 

Wlicre my shame may be forgot ; 

And the story of my life 
And my sin remein' ere 1 not. 

So forget the faitliiess wife ; 

Or if, haply, when I'm dead, 
On some worthier happier breast 

Than mine was, you lean your head, 
Should one thought of me molest 

Those calm hours, recall me only 
As you see me, — worn with tears : 

Dying desolate here ; left hmely 
By the overthrow of years. 

May I lay my arm, then, there ? 

Does it not seem strange to you, 
This old hand among your hair ? 

And these wasted fingers too ? 



tHE WIFE'S TRAGEDY. 



433 



How the lamp wanes I All grows 
dark- 
Dark and sti-ange. Yet now there 
shined [hark ! 

Sometliiiig past nie . . . Husband, 
There are voices on the wind. 

Are they come ? and do they ask me 

For the songs we nsed to sing ? 
Strange that memory thus should 
task me ! 
Listen — 

Birds are on the wing : 

And thy Birthday Morn is rising. 

May it ever rise as bright ! 
Wake not yet ! The day's devising 

Fair new things for thy delight. 

Wake not yet! Last night this 
flower 

Near thy porch began to pout 
From its warm sheath ■' in an hour 

All the young leaves will be out. 

Wake not yet! So dear thou art, 
love, 
That I grudge these buds the bliss 
Each will bring to thy young heart, 
love, 
Iioould claim all for my kiss. 

Wake not yet ! 

— There now, It fails me ! 

Is 7ny lord there ? I am ill. 
And I cannot tell what ails me. 

Husband ! Is he near me still ? 

O, this anguish seems to crush 
All my life up,— body and mind ! 

THE EARL. 

Gertrude ! Gertrude ! Gertrude ! 

GERTRUDE. 

Hush ! 
There are voices in the wind. 

THE EARL. 

Still she wanders ! Ah, the pluck- 
ing 
At the sheet I 

GERTRUDE. 

Hist ! do not take it 

28 



From my bosom. See, 'tis sucking ! 
If it sleep we must not wake it. 

Such a little rosy mouth ! 

— Xot to-niglit, O not to-night ! 
Did he tell me in the South [Iright ? 

That those stars were twice as 

Off! away ! unhand me — go ! 

I forgive thee my lost heaven. 
And the wrong which thou didst do. 

Would my sin, too, Avere forgiven! 

Gone at last ! . . . Ah, fancy feigns 
These wild visions ! I grow weak. 

Fast, fast dying! Life's warmth 
wanes 
From me. Is the fire out ? 

THE EARL. 

Speak, 

Gertrude, speak! My wife, my 
M'ife ! 

Nay she is not dead. — not dead ! 
See, the lips move. There is life. 

She is choking. Lift her head. 

GERTRUDE. 

****** 

Death ! . . . My eyes grow dim, and 
dimmer. 

I can scarcely see thy face. 
But the twilight seems to glimmer, 

Lighted from some distant place. 

Husband ! 

THE EARL. 

Gertrude ! 

GERTRUDE. 

Art thou near me ? 

On thy breast — once more — thy 

breast ! [me, 

I have sinned — and — nay, yet hear 

And repented — and — 

THE EARL. 

The rest 
God hath heard, where now thou art, 
Thou poor soul, — in Heaven. 

The door — 
Close it softly, and depart. 
Leave us ! 

She is mine once more. 



434 



MINOR POEMS. 



imOR POEMS. 



THE PARTmG OFLAUNCELOT 
AND GUENEVERE. 

A FRAGMEXT. 

Now, as the time wore by to Our 

Lady's Day, 
Spring lingered in the chambers of 

the Soutli. 
The nightingales were far in fairy 

lands 
Beyond the snnset: but the wet blue 

woods 
Were half aware of violets in the 

wake 
Of morning rains. The swallow still 

delayed 
To - build and be about in noisy 

roofs, 
And March was moaning in the 

windy elm. 

But Arthur's royal purpose held to 
keep 

A joust of arms to solemnize the 
time 

In stately Camelot. So the King sent 
forth 

His heralds, and let cry through all 
the land 

That he himself would take the lists, 
and lilt 

Against all comer*. 

Hither came the chiefs 

Of Christendom. The Kin j; of North- 
gal ies ; 

Anguishe, the King of Ireland ; the 
Haut Prince, 

Sir Galahault ; the King o' the 
Hundred Knights ; 

The Kings of Scotland and of Brit- 
tany ; 

And many more renowne'd knights 
whc/.ijf 



The names are glorious. Also all 

the earls, 
And all the dukes, and all the mighty 

men 
And famous heroes of the Table 

Konnd, 
Fi-om far Northumberland to where 

the wave 
Eides rough on Devon from the outer 

main. 
So that there was not seen for seven 

years, 
Since when, at Whitsuntide, Sir 

Galahad 
Departed out of Carlyel from the 

court, 
So fair a fellowship ui goodly 

knights. 

Then Avould King Arthur that the 

Queen should ride 
With him from Carlyel to Camelot 
To see the jousts. But she, because 

that yet 
The sickness was upon her, answered 

nay. 
Then said King Arthur, " This i-e- 

penteth me. 
For never hath been seen for seven 

years, [tide. 

No, not since Galahad at Whitsun- 
Departed from us out of Carlyel, 
So fair a fellowship of goodly 

knights." 
But tl ^. Queen would not, and the 

king In wrath. 
Brake up the court, and rode to As- 

tolat 
On this side Camelot. 

Now men saiil the Queen 
Tarried behind because of Launce- 

lot, 
For Launcelot stayed to heal him of 

his wound. 



MINOR POEMS. 



435 



And there bad been estrangement 
'twixt these two 

I' the later time, because of bitter 
words. 

So wlieii the king with all his fellow- 
ship 

Was ridden out of Carlyel, the Queen 

Arose, and called to her Sir Lauuce- 
lot. 

Then to Sir Launcelot spoke Queen 
Guenevere. 

" Not foi- the memory of that love 

whereof 
No more than memory lives, but, 

Sir, for that 
"Which even when love is ended yet 

endures 
Making immortal life with deathless 

deeds, 
Honor — true knighthood's golden 

spurs, the crown 
And priceless diadem of peerless 

Queens, — 
I make appeal to you, that hear per- 
chance 
The last appeal whicli I shall ever 

make. 
So weinh my words not lightly ! for 

Ifeel 
The fluttering fires of life grow faint 

and cold 
About my heart. And oft, indeed, 

to me 
Lying wliole hours awake in the 

dead nights 
The end seems near, as though the 

dai'kness knew 
The angel waiting there to call my 

soul 
Percliance before the house awakes ; 

and oft 
When faint, and all at once, from 

far away. 
The mournful midnight bells begin 

to sound 
Across the river, all the days that 

were 
(Brief, evil days!) return upon my 

heart, 



And, where the sweetness seemed, I j 

see the sin. j 

For, waking lone, long hours before 

the dawn, 
Beyond the borders of the dark I 

seem 
To see the twilight of another world. 
That grows and grows and glimmers 

on my gaze. 
And oft, when late, before the lan- 
guorous moon 
Through yonder windows to the 

West goes down 
Among the pines, deep peace upon 

me falls. 
Deep peace like death, so that I 

think I know 
The blesse'd Mary and the righteous 

saints 
Stand at the throne and intercede 

for me. 
Wherefore these things are thus I 

cannot tell. 
But now I pray you of your fealty, 
And by all knightly faith which may 

be left. 
Arise and get you hence, and join 

the King. 
For wherefore hold you thus behind 

the court. 
Seeing my liege the King is moved 

in wrath ? 
For wete you well what say your 

foes and mine. 
"See how Sir Launcelot and Queen 

Guenevere 
Do hold them ever thus behind the 

King 
That they may take their pleasure ! 

Knowing not 
How that for me all these delights 

are come 
To be as withered violets." 

Half in tears 
She ceased abrupt. Given up to the 

pioud grief. 
Vexed to l)e vext. With love and 

anger moved. :• 

Love toucht with scorn, and anger 

pierced with love. 






436 



MINOR POEMS. 



About her, all unheeded, her long 

hair 
Loosed its warm, yellow, ■waving 

lovelincsf, 
And o'er her bare and shiningshoul- 

der cold 
Fell floating free. Upon one full 

white, arm. 
To which the amorous purple cover- 
let 
Clung dimpling close, her drooping 

state Mas propt. 
There, half in shadow of her soft 

gold curls. 
She leaned, and like a rose enricht 

with dew. 
Whose heart is heavy with the cling- 
ing bee. 
Bowed down toward him all her 

glowiiig face. 
While the light of her large angry 

eyes 
Uprose, and rose, a slow imperious 

sori'ow. 
And o'er the shine of still, unquiver- 

ing tears 
Swam on to him. 

But he, with brows averse 
And orgolous looks, three times to 

speech addressed. 
Three times in vain. The silence of 

the place 
Fell like a hand upon lus heart, and 

hushed 
His foolish anger with authority. 
He would not see the wretched 

Queen : he saw 
Only the hunter on the arrassed 

wall 
Prepaie to wind amort his bugle 

horn. 
And the long daylight dying down 

the floors ; 
For halt-way tlirough the golden 

gates of eve 
The sun was rolled. The dropping 

ta]K\stry glowed 
With awful hues. Far off among 

his reeds [light, 

The river, smitten with a waning 



Shone; aiul, behind black lengths of 

pine revealed, 
The red West smouldered, and the 

day declined. 
Then year by year, as wave on wave 

a sea. 
The tided Past came softly o'er lus 

heart. 
And all the days which had been. 

So he stood 
Long in his mind divided: with him- 
self 
At strife: and, like a steed thatliotly 

chafes 
His silver bit, which yet some silken 

rein 
Swayed by a skilled accustomed 

luxnd restrains, 
His lieart against tlie knowledge of 

its love 
Made vain revolt, and fretful rose and 

sunk. 
But at the last, quelling a wayward 

grief, 
That swelled against all utterance, 

and songht 
To force its salt aiul sorrowful over- 
flow 
Upon weak language, "Now in- 
deed," lie cried, 
"I see the face of the old time is 

changed. 
And all things altered ! Will the 

sun still burn ? 
Still burn the eternal stars ? For 

love Avas deemed 
Not less secure than these. Needs 

should there be 
Something remarkable to prove the 

world 
I am no more that Launcelot, nor 

thou 
That Guenevcre, of whom, long 

since, the fame, 
Fruitful of noble deeds, with such a 

light 
Did fill this nook and cantle of the 

earth. 
That all great lands of Christendom 

beside 



MINOR POEMS. 



437 



Showed darkened of their glory. But 

I see 
That there isnotliingleft for men to 

swear by. 
For then thy will did never urge me 

hence, 
But drew me through all dangers to 

thy feet. 
And none can say, least thou, I have 

not been [fame. 

The staff and burgonet of thy fair 
Nor mind you, Madam, how in Sur- 

luse once, 
Wlien all the estates were met, and 

noble judijes, 
Armed clean Avith shields, set roimd 

to keep the right, 
Before yon sitting throned with 

Galahault 
In great array, on fair green quilts 

of samite, 
Rich, ancient, fringed with gold, 

seven summer days. 
And all before the Earls of North- 
gal ies, 
Such service then with this old 

sword was wrought. 
To crown thy beauty in the courts of 

Fame, 
That in that time fell many noble 

knights. 
And all men marvelled greatly? So 

when last 
The loud horns blew to lodging, and 

we supped 
With Palamedes and with Lamorak, 
All those great dukes and kings, and 

famous queens, 
Beholding us Avith a deep joy, 

avouched 
Across the golden cups of costly 

wine 
'There is no Queen of love but 

Guenevere, 
And no true knight butLauncelot of 

the Lake !'" 

Thus he, transported by the thought 

of days 
And deeds that, like the muuruful 

martial sounds 



Blown through sad towns where 

some dead king goes by. 
Made music in the chambers of his 

heart. 
Swept by the mighty memory of the 

past. 
Nor spake the sorrowful Queen, nor 

from deep muse 
Unbent the grieving beauty of her 

brows, 
But held her heart's proud pain 

superbly still. 

But when he lifted up his looks, it 

seemed 
Something of sadness in the ancient 

place. 
Like dying breath from lips beloved 

of yore. 
Or unforgotten touch of tender 

hands 
After long j'ears, upon his spirit 

fell. 
For near the carven casement hung 

the bird. 
With hood and jess, that oft had led 

them forth. 
These lovers, through the heart of 

rippling woods 
At morning, in the old and pleasant 

time. 
And o'er the broidered canopies of 

state 
Blazed Uther's dragons, curious, 

wrought with gems. 
Then to his mind that dear and dis- 
tant dawn 
Came back, when first, a boy at 

Arthur's court, 
He paused abasht before the youth- 
ful Queen. 
And, feeling now her long imploring 

gaze 
Holding him in its sorrow, when he 

marked 
How changed her state, and all un- 
like to her. 
The most renowned beauty of the 

time, 
xVnd pearl of chivalry, for whom 

himself 



438 



MINOR POEMS. 



All on a summer's day broke, long 

of yore 
A hundred lances in the field, he 

sprang 
And caught her hand, and, falling to 

one knee, 
Arched all his haughty neck to a 

quick kiss. 
And there was silence. Silently the 

West 
Grew red and redder, and the day 

declined. 

As o'er the hungering heart of some 

de(M) sea, 
That swells against the planets and 

the moon 
With sad continual strife and vain 

unrest. 
In silence rise and roll the laboring 

cloiuls 
That bind the thunder, o'er the 

heaving heart 
Of Guenevere all sorrows fraught 

with love. 
All stormy sorrows, in that silence 

passed. 
And like a star in that tumultuous 

night 
Love waxed and waned, and came 

and went, changed hue, 
And was and was not : till the cloud 

came down. 
And all her soul dissolved in show- 
ers : and love 
Rose tin ouj;h the broken storm; and, 

A\itli a cry 
Of passion sheathed in sharpest 

pain, she stretched 
Wide her warm arms : she rose, she 

reeleJ, and fell 
(All her great heart unqueened) 

upon the breast 
Of Launcelot; and, lifting up her 

voice. 
She wept aloud, "Unhappy that I 

am," 
She wept, " Unhappy ! Would that 

I had died 
Long since, long ere I loved thee, 

Lauucelot ! I 



Would I had died long since ! ere I 

had known 
This pain, which hath become my 

punishment. 
To have thirsted for the sea: to have 

received 
A drop no bigger than a drop of 

dew ! 
I have done ill," she wept, " I am 

forlorn. 
Forlorn ! I falter where I stood 

secure : 
The tower I built is fall'n, is fall'n ; 

the staff 
I leaned upon hath broken in my 

hand. 
And I, disrobed, dethroned, dis- 
crowned, and all undone. 
Survive my kingdom, widowed of 

all rule, 
And men shall mock me for a foolish 

Queen. 
For now I see thy love for me is 

dead. 
Dead that brief love which was the 

light of life. 
And all is dark: and I have lived too 

long. 
For how henceforth, unhappy, shall 

I bear 
To dwell among these halls where 

we have been ? 
How keep these chambers emptied 

of thy voice ? 
The walks where we have lingered 

long ago, [love. 

The gardens and the places of our 
Which shall recall the days that 

come no more. 
And all the joy which has been ?" 

Thus o'erthrown, 
And on the breast of Launcelot 

weeping wild — 
Weeping and murmuring — hung 

Queen Guenevere. 
But, while she wept, upon her brows 

and lips 
Warm kisses fell, Avarm kisses wet 

with tears. 
For all his miud was melted with re- 
morse, 



MINOR POEMS. 



439 



And all his scorn was killed, and all 

his heart 
Gave way in that caress, and all the 

love 
Of happier years rolled down upon 

his soul 
Kedoubled ; and he bowed his head, 
' and cried, 

" Though thou be variable as the 

waves. 
More sharp than winds among the 

Hebrides 
That shut the frozen Spring in 

stormy clouds, 
As wayward as a child, and all un- 
just, 
Yet must I love thee in despite of 

pain, 
Thou peerless Queen of perfect love ! 

Thou star 
That draw'st all tides ! Thou god- 
dess far above 
■ My heart's weak worship ! so adored 

thou art, 
And I so irreti-ievably all thine ! 
But now I will arise, as thou hast 

said, 
And join the King : and these thine 

enemies 
Shall know thee not defenceless any 

more. 
For, either, living, I yet hold my 

life 
To arm for thine, or, dying, by my 

death 
Will steep love's injured honor in 

such blood 
Shall wash out every stain ! And so 

farewell, [far. 

Beloved. Forget me not when I am 
But in thy prayers and in thine even- 
ing thoughts 
Kemember me : as I, when sundown 

crowns 
The distant hills, and Ave-Mary 

rings. 
Shall pine for thee on ways where 

thou art not." 

So these two lovers in one long em- 
brace, 



An agony of reconcilement, liung 
Blinded in tears and kisses, lip to 

Jip, 
And tranced from past and future, 

time and space. 

But by this time, tlie beam of the 

slope day, 
Edging blue mountain glooms with 

sullen gold, 
A dying fire, fell mournfully athwart 
The purple chambers. In the courts 

below 
The shadow of the keep from wall to 

wall 
Shook his dark skirt : great chimes 

began to sound. 
And swing, and rock in glimmering 

heights, and roll 
A reeling music down : but ere it 

fell 
Faint bells in misty spires adown the 

vale 
Caught it. and bore it floating on to 

night. 

So from that long love-trance the 

envious time 
Keclaimed them. Then with a great 

pang he rose 
Like one that plucked his heart out 

from his breast, 
And, bitterly unwinding her white 

arms 
From the warm circle of their amor- 
ous fold. 
Left living on her lips the lingering 

heat 
Of one long kiss : and, gathering 

strongly back 
His poured-out anguisli to his soul, 

he went. 

And the sun set. 

Long while she sat alone. 

Searching the silence with her fixe'd 
eyes, 

While far and farther off o'er dis- 
tant floors 

The intervals of brazen echoes fell. 

A changeful light, from varying pas- 
sions caught, 



440 



MINOR POEMS. 



Flushed all her stalely cheek from 

while lo red 
In doublful ailernaliou, as some star 
Changes his fiery beauty : for her 

blootl 
Set headlong to all wayward moods 

ot sense, 
Stirred with swift ebb and flow : till 

suddenly all 
The frozen heights of grief fell 

loosed, fast, fast, 
In calaract over cataract, on her soul. 
Then at the last she rose, a reeling 

shape 
That liUe a shadow swayed against 

the wall. 
Pier slight hand held upon her bosom, 

and fell 
Before the Virgin Mother on her 

knees. 
There, in a halo of the silver shrine, 
That touched and turned to starlight 

her slow tears, 
Below the feet of the pale-pictured 

saint 
She lay, poured out in prayer. 

Meanwhile, without, 
A sigliing rain from a low fringe of 

cloud 
Whispered among the melancholy 

hills. 
The night's dark limits widened : far 

above 
The crystal sky lay open : and the 

star 
Of eve, his rosy circlet trembling 

clear. 
Grew large and bright, and in the 

silver moats. 
Between the accumulated terraces. 
Tangled a trail of fire : and all was 

still. 

A SUXSET FANCY. 

JrsT at sunset, I would be 

In some isle garden, where the sea 

1 look into shall seem more blue 

Than those dear and deep eyes do. 

And, if anywhere the breeze 

Shall have stii'rod the cypress-trees, 



Straight the yellow light falls 

through. 
Catching me, for once, at ease ; 
Just so much as may impinge 
Some tall lily with a tinge 
Of orange ; while, above the wall, 
Tumbles downward into view 
(With a sort of small surprise) 
One star moi'e among them all, 
For me to watch with half-shut eyes. 

[ Or else upon the breezy deck 
Of some felucca ; and one speck 

; 'Twixl the crimson and the yellow, 

I Which may be a little fleck 

I Of cloud, or gull with outstretcht 

i neck, 

; To Spezia bound from Cape Circello; 
With a sea-song in my ears 
Of the bronzed buccaneeis : 
While the night is waxing mellow. 
And the helmsman slackly steers, — 
Leaning, talking to his fellow. 
Who has oaths for all he hears, — 
Each thief swarthier than Othello. 
Or, in fault of belter things, 
(.;lose in sound of one who sings 
To casements, in a southern city ; 
Tinkling upon tender strings 
Some melodious old love-ditty ; 
While a laughing lady flings 
One rose to liini, just for pity. 
But I have not any want 
Sweeter than to be with you. 
When the long light falleth slant. 
And heaven turns a darker blue ; 
And a deeper smile grows through 
'i..o glance asleep 'neath those soft 

lashes. 
Which the heart it steals into 
First inspires and then abashes. 
Just to hold your hand, — one touch 
So light you scarce should feel it 

sucii ! 
.Just to watch you leaning o'er 
Those window-roses, love, ... no 
more, 

ASSOCIATIONS. 
You know the place is just the same! 
The rooks build here : the sandy 
hill is 



MINOR POEMS. 



44 r 



Ablaze with broom, as when she 

came 
Across the sea with her new name 
To dwell among the moated lilies. 

The trifoly is on the walls : 

The ilaisies in the bowling-alley : 
The ox at eve lows from the stalls : 
At eve the cuckoo, tloaling, calls, 
When foxgloves tremble in the 
valley. 

The iris blows from court to comt : 

The bald white spider flits, or 

stays in 

The chinks behind the dragonwort : 

That Triton still, at his old sport, 

Blows bubbles in his broken basin. 

The terrace where she used to walk 
Still shines at noon between the 
roses : 
The garden paths are blind with 

chalk : 
The dragon-fly from stalk to stalk 
Swims sparkling blue till evening 
closes. 

Then, just above that long dark 
copse. 
One warm red star comes out, and 
passes 
Westward, and mounts, and momits, 

and stops 
(Or seems to) o'er the turret-tops. 
And lights those lonely casement- 
glasses. 

Sir Ralph still wears that old grim 
smile. 
The staircase creaks as up I 
clamber 
To those still rooms, to muse awhile. 
I see the little meadow-stile 
As I lean from the great south- 
chamber. 

And Lady Ruth is just as white. 
(Ah, still, that face seems strangely 

like her !) 
The latly and the wicked knight — 



All just the same — she swooned for 
fright— 
And he — his arm still raised to 
strike her. 

Her boudoir — no one enters there : 
The very flowers which last she 
gathered 
Are in the vase ; the lute — the 

chair — 
And all things — just as then they 
were ! 
Except the jasmins, — those are 
withered. 

But when along the corridors 
The last red pause of day is stream- 
ing, 
I seem to hear her up the floors : 
I seem to see her through the doors: 
And then I know that I am dream- 
ing. 

MEETING AGAI^f. 

Yes ; I remember the white rose. 

And since then the young ivy 

has grown ; 
From your window we could not 

reach it, and now it i» over the 

stone. 
We did not part as we meet, Dear. 

Well, Time hath his own stern 

cures ! 
And Alice's eyes are deeper, and 

her hair has grown like yoiu'S. 

Is our greeting all so strange then ? 

But there's something here 

amiss, 
Wlien it is not well to speak kindly. 

And the olives are ripe l)y this. 
I had not thought you so altered. 

But all is changed, God 

knows ! 
Good-night. It is night so soon 

now. Look there ! you have 

dropt your rose. 

Nay, I have one that is withered and 
dearer to me. I came 



442 



MINOR POEMS. 



To say sood-night, little Alice. She 

does not remember my name. 
It is but tlie damp that is mailing 

my head and my heart ache 

so. 
I never was strong in the old time, 

as the others were, you know. 

And you'll sleep well, will you not, 

Darling ? The old words 

sound so dear ! 
'Tis the last time 1 shall use them; 

you need show neither anger 

nor fear. 
It is well that you look so cheerful. 

And is time so smooth with 

you? 
How foolish I am I Good night, 

Dear. And bid Alice good 

night too. 



ARISTOCRACY. 

To thee be all men heroes : every 

race 
Noble : all women virgins : and 

each place 
A temple : know thou nothing that 

is base. 



THE MERMAIDEX. 

He was a Prince with golden hair 
(In a palace beside the sea), 

And I but a poor Mermaiden, — 
And how should he care for me ? 

Last summer I came, in the long 

blue nights, 
To sit in the cool sea-caves : 
Last summer he came to count the 

stars 
From his terrace above the waves. 

There's nothing so fair in the sea 
down there 
As the light on his golden tresses: 
There's nothing so sweet as his 
voice : ah, nothing 
So warm as the warmth of his 
kisses ! 



I could not help but love him, love 
him. 

Till my love grew pain to me. 
And to-morrow he weds the Princess 

In that palace beside the sea. 



AT HER CASEMENT. 

I AM knee-deep in grass, in this 

wai'm June night. 
In the shade here, shut off from the 

great moonlight. 
All alone, at her casement there. 
She sits in the light, and she combs 

her hair. 
She shakes it over the carven seat, 
And combs it down to her stately 

feet. 
And I watch her, hid in the blue 

June night. 
Till my soul "grows faint with the 

costly sight. 
There's no flaw on that fair fine brow 

of hers. 
As fair and as proud as Lucifer's. 
She looks in the glass as she turns 

her head : 
She knows that the rose on her cheek 

is red : 
She knows how her dark eyes shine, 

— their light 
Would scarcely be dimnied though I 

died to-night. 

I would that there in her chamber I 

stood, 
Full-face to her terrible beauty ! I 

would 
I were laid on her queenly breast, at 

her lips, 
With her warm hair wound through 

my finger-tips. 
Draining hei' soul at one deep-drawn 

kiss 
And I would be humbly content for 

this 
To die, as is due, before the morn, 
Killed by her slowly returning 

scoru. 



MINOR POEMS. 



443 



A FAREWELL. 

Be happy, child. The last wild 

words are spoken. 
To-morrow, mine no more, the world 

will claim thee. 
I blame thee not. But all my life is 

broken. 
Of that brief Past I have no single 

token. 
Never in years to come my lips shall 

name thee, 
Never, child, never ! 

I will not say " Forget me ; " nor 

those hours 
Which were so sweet. Some scent 

dead leaves retain. 
Keep all the flowers I gave thee — all 

the flowers 
Dead, dead ! Though years on years 

of life were ours, [again ; 

As we have met we shall not meet 
Forever, child, forever ! 



AN EVENING IN TUSCANY. 

Look ! the sim sets. Now's the 
rarest 
Hour of all the blessed day. 
(Just the hour, love, you look 
fairest !) 
Even the snails are out to play. 

Cool the breeze mounts, like this 

Chianti 

Which I drain down to the sun. 

— There ! shut up that old green 

Dante,— 

Turn the page, where we begun, 

At the last news of Ulysses, — 
A grand image, fit to close 

Just such grand gold eves as this is, 
Full of splendor and repose 1 

So loop up those long bright 
tresses, — 
Only, one or two must fall 
Down your warm neck Evening 
kisses 
Through the soft curls spite of all. 



Ah, but rest in your still place 
there ! [pleasure 

Stir not — turn not ! the warm 
Coming, going in your face there, 

And the rose (no richer treasure) 

In your bosom, like my love there, 
Just half secret and half seen ; 

And the soft light from above there 
Streaming o'er you where you 
lean, 

With your fair head in the shadow 
Of that grass-hat's glancing brim. 

Like a daisv in a meadow 
Which its own deej) fringes dim. 

O you laugh, — you cry " What 
folly ! " 

Yet you'd scarcely have me wise. 
If I judge right, judging wholly 

By the secret in your eyes. 

But look down now, o"er the city 
Sleeping soft among the hills, — 

Our dear Florence ! That great Pitti 
With its steady shadow tills 

Half the town up : its iniwinking 
Cold white windows, as they 
glare [ing 

Down the long streets, set one think- 
Of the old dukes who lived there ; 

And one pictures those strange men 
so ! — 

Subtle brains, andiron thews ! 
There, the gardens of Lorenzo, — 

The long cypress avenues 

Creep up slow the stately hillside 
Where tlie meriy loungers are. 

But far more I love this still side, — 
The blue plain you see so far ! 

Wliere the shore of bright white 
villas 
Leaves off faint: the purple 
breadths 
Of the olives and the willows : 
And the gold-rimmed mountain- 
widths : 



444 



MINOR POEMS. 



AlV tniiipfii' 1 ill slumbrous ;;lory 
To one l)u nine; point — tlio sun ! 

But up here, — slow, cold, and lioary 
Kcacli tlie olives, one by one : 

And tbo land looks fresh : the yellow 
Arbute-bcrrit's, liere and lliere, 

Glowing slowly ripe and mellow 
Tlirough a tiusli of rosy hair. 

For tlie Tramontana last -week 
\Vas about : 'tis scarce three 
weeks 
Since the snow lay, one white vast 
streak, 
Upon tliose old purple peaks. 

So to-day among the grasses 

One may pick up tens and twelves 

Of yomig olives, as one passes, 
Blown about, and by tliemselves 

Blackening sullen-ripe. The corn 
too 
Grows each day from green to 
golden. 
Tlie large-eyed wind-flowers forlorn 
too 
Blow among it, unbeholden : 

Some white, some crimson, others 
Purple blackening to the heart. 
From the deej) wheat-sea, which 
smothers 
Their bright globes up, how they 
start ! 

And the small wild pinks from ten- 
der 

Feather-grasses peep at us : 
While above them bums, on slender 

Stems, the red gladiolus : 

And the grapes are green : this sea- 
son 
They'll be round and sound and 
true. 
If no after-blight should seize on 
Those young bunches turning blue. 

O that night of purple weather ! 

(Just before the moon liad set) 
You remember how togetlier 

We walked home ?— the grass was 
wet — 



The long grass in the Poderc — 
Willi the "n.iiiiiy dew among it : 

And that nightingale— the fairy 
Song he sung— O how he sung it I 

And the fig-trees had grown heavy 
With the young tigs white and 
M'oolly, 

And tlie fire-flies, bevy on bevy 
Of soft sparkles, pouring fully 

Their warm life through trance on 
trances 
Of thick citron-^shades behind. 
Rose, like swarms of loving fancies 
Through some rich and pensive 
mind. 

So we reached the loggia. Leaning 
Faint, we sat there in the shade. 

Neither spoke. The night's deep 
meaning 
Filled the silence up unsaid. 

Hoarsely through the cypress alK/ 

A civetta out of tune 
Tried his voice by fits. The valley 

Lay all dark below the moon. 

Until into song you burst out, — 
That old song I made for you 

When we found our rose, — the first 
out 
Last sweet Springtime in the dew. 

Well ! ... if things had gone less 
wildly- 
Had I settled down before 
There, in England — labored mildly — 
And been patient — and learned 
more 

Of how men should live in London — 
Been less happy — or more wise — 

Left no great works tried, and un- 
done — 
Never looked in j'our soft eyes — 

I . . . but what's the use of think- 
ing ? 

There ! our nightingale begins — 
Now a rising note — now sinking 

Back in little broken rings 



Minor poems. 



445 



Of warm song that spread and eddy — 
Now he picks up heart — and draws 

His great niiisie, slow and sleady, 
To a silver-centred pause ! 

SONG. 

The purple iris hangs his head 

On his lean stallc, and so declines: 
Tlie spider spills his silver thread 

Between the bells of columbines : 
An altered light in flickering eves 
Draws dews through these dim 

eyes of ours : 
Death walks in yonder waning 
bowers, 
And burns the blistering leaves. 
Ah, well- a day ! 
Blooms overblow : 
Suu'S sink away : 
Sweet tlinigs decay. 

The drunken beetle, roused ere 
night. 
Breaks blundering from the rot- 
ting rose. 
Flits tlirough blue spidery aconite, 

And hums, and comes, and goes : 
His thick, bewildered song receives 
A diowsy sense of grief like ours : 
He hums and hums among the 
bf)wers. 
And bajigs about the leaves. 
Ah. well-a-day ! 
Hearts overflow : 
Joy flits away : 
Sweet tilings .decay. 

Her yellow stars the jasniin drops 

In mildewed mosses one by one : 
The hollyhocks fall off their'tops : 
The lotus-blooms ail white i" the 
sun : 
The freckled foxglove faints and 
grieves : 
The smooth-paced slumbrous slug 

devours 
The gluey globes of gorgeous flow- 
ei's. 
And smears the glistering leaves ! 
Ah, well-a day ! 
Life leaves us so. 



Love dare not stay. 
Sweet things decay. 

From brazen sunflowers, orb and 
fringe, 
The burning burnisli dulls and 
dies : 
Sad Autumn sets a sullen tinge 

Upon the scornful peonies : 
The dewy frog limps out, and heaves 
A speckled liuup in speckled bow- 
ers : 
A reeking moisture, clings and 
lowers 
The lips of lapping leaves. 
Ah, well-a-day ! 
Ere the cock crow. 
Life's charmed array 
Eeels all away. 

SEASIDE SONGS. 



I. 



Drop down below the orbed sea, 

O lingering light in glowing skies, 
And bring my own true-love to me — 
My dear tinie-Iove across the sea — 
With tender-lighted eyes. 

For now the gates of Night are flung 
Wide open her dark coasts among : 
And the happy stars crowd up, 
and up. 
Like bubbles that brighten, one 
by one, 
To the dark wet brim of some 
glowing cup 
Filled fuU to the parting sun. 

And moment after moment grows 
In grandeur up from deep to deep 
Of darkness, till the night hath 

clomb, 
From star to star, heaven's 
highest dome. ■ 
And, like a new thought born in 
sleep. 
The slumbrous glory glows, and 

glows : 
AVhile. far below, a whisper goes 
That heaves the hajjpy sea : 



446 



MINOR POEMS. 



For o^r faint tracts of fragrance 

wide, 
A rapture pouring up the tide — 
A fresluiess through the beat — a 

sweet, 
Uncertain sound, like fairy feet — 
Tlie west-wind blows my love to 

me. 

Love-laden from the lighted west 
Thou comest, with thy soul oppi'est 
For joy of him : all up the dim, 

Delicious sea blow fearlessly, 
Warm wind, that art the tenderest 
Or all that breathe from south or 
west, 

Blow whispers of him up the sea : 
Upon my cheek, and on my breast. 
And nn the lips which he hath prest, 

1)1 i\v all his kisses back to me ! 

Far off, the dark gi'een rocks about, 
All night shines, faint and fair, 
the far light : 
Far off, the lone, late fishers shout 
From boat to boat i' tlie lister :iig 
starlight : 
Far off, and fair, the sea lies bare. 
Leagues, leagues beyond the reach 
of rowing : 
Up creek and horn the smooth wave 
swells 
And falls asleep ; or, inland flow- 
ing? 
Twinkles among the silver shells, 
From sluice to sluice of shallow 
wells ; 
Or, down dark pools of purple 
glowing. 
Sets sc)me forlorn star trembling 
there 
In his own dim, dreamlike bril- 
liancy. 
And I feel the dark sails grow- 
ing 
Nearer, clearer, up the sea : 
And I catch the warm west 
blowing 

. A.11 my own love's sighs to me : 

On the deck I hear them singing 
Songs they sing in my own laud ; 
27 



Lights are swinging : bells are ring> 
ing : 
On the deck 1 see him stand ! 

11. 

The day is down into his bower : 
In languid lights liis feet he steeps: 

The flusht sky darkens, low and 
lower, 
And closes on the glowing deeps. 

In creeping curves of yellow foam 
Up shallow sands the waters slide: 

And warmly blow what whispers 
roam 
From isle to isle the lulle'd tide : 

The boats are drawn : the nets drip 
bright : 
Dark casements gleatn : old songs 
are sung : 
And out upon the verge of night 
Green liu'lus from lonely rocks are 
hung. 

winds of eve that somewhere 

rove 
"Where darkest sleeps the distant 

sea, 
Seek out where haply dreams my 

love, 
And whisper all her dreams to 

me ! 

THE SUMMER - TIME THAT 
WAS. 

The swallow is not come yet ; 

The I'iver-banks are brown ; 
The woodside walks are dumb yet, 

And di'eary is the town. 

1 miss a face from the window, 
A footstep from the grass ; 

I miss the boyhood of my lieart. 
And the summer-time that was. 

How shall I read the books' I read, 

Or meet the men I met ? 
I thought to find her rose-tree dead. 

But It is growing yet. 



MINOR POEMS. 



447 



Aud the river winds among the 
flags, 
And tlie leaf lies on tlie grass. 
But I walk alone. My liopes are 
gone, 
And the summer-time that was. 



ELAYNE LE BLANC. 

O THAT sweet season on the April- 

vei'ge 
Of womanhood ! When smiles are 

toucht with tears, 
And all the nnsolaced summer 

seems to grieve 
With some bHud want : when Eden- 
exiles feel 
Their Faradisal parentage, and 

search 
Even yet some fragrance througli 

the thorny years 
From reachless gardens guarded by 

the sword. 

Then those that brood above the 

fallen sun, 
Or lean from lonely casements to 

the moon, • 
Turn round and miss the touching 

of a hand : 
Then sad thoughts seem to be more 

sweet than gay ones : 
Then old songs have a sound as 

pitiful 
As dead friends' voices, sometimes 

heard in dreams : 
And all a-tlptoe for some great 

event, 
The Present waits, her finger at her 

lips, 
The while the pensive Past with 

meek pale palms, 
Crost (where a child should lie) on 

lier cold breast. 
And wistful eyes forlorn, stands 

mutely by, 
Reproaching Life with some un- 

uttered loss ; 
And the heart pines, a prisoned 

Danae, 



Till some God comes, and makes 
the air all golden. 

In such a mood as this, at such an 

hour 
As makes sad thoughts fall saddest 

on the soul. 
She, in her topmost bower all alone, 
Higii-up among the battlemented 

roofs, 
Leaned from the lattice, where the 

road runs by 
To Camelot, and in the bulrush beds 
The marish river shrinks his stag- 
nant horn. 
All round, along the spectral arras, 

gleamed 
(With faces pale against the dreary 

light. 
Forms of great Queens — the women 

of old times. 
She felt their frowns upon her, and 

their smiles. 
And seemed to hear their garments 

rustling near. 
Her lute lay idle her love-books 

among : 
And, at her feet, flung by, the 

broidered scarf, 
And velvet mantle. On the verge 

of night 
She saw a bird float by, and w-ished 

for wings : 
She heard the hoarse frogs quarrel 

in the marsh : 
And now and then, with drowsy 

song and oar. 
Some dim barge sliding slow from 

bridge to bridge, 
Down the white river past, and far 

behind 
Left a new silence. Then she fell 

to muse 
Unto what end she came into this 

earth 
Whose reachless beauty made her 

heart so sad, 
As one that loves, but hopes not, 

inly ails 
In gazing on some fair unloving 

face. 



44 



MIKOR POEMS. 



Anon, there dropt down a great gulf 

of sky 
A star she knew ; and as she looked 

at it, 
Down-drawn througli her intensity 

of gaze, 
One angry ray fell tangled in her 

tears. 
And dashed its blinding brightness 

in her eyes. 
She turned, and caught her lute, and 

pensively 
Rippled a random music down the 

strings. 
And sang ... 

All night the moonbeams bathe 
the sward. 

There's not an eye to-night in Joy- 
ous- Gard 

That is not dreaming something 
sweet. 1 wake 

Because it is more sweet to dream 
awake : 

Dreaming I see thy face upon the 
lake. 

I am come up from far, love, to be- 
hold thee, 

That hast waited for me so bravely 
and well 

Thy sweet life long (for the Fairies 
had told thee 

I am the Kni2;ht that shall loosen 
the spell), 

And to-morrow morn mine arms 
shall infold thee : 

And to-morrow night . . . ah, who 
can tell ? 

As the spirit of some dark lake 
Pines at nightfall, wild-awake, 
For the approaching consumma- 
tion 
Of a great moon he divines 
Coming to her coronation 
Of the dazzling stars and signs, 
So my heart, my heart, 
Darkly (ah, an(i tremblingly !) 
Waits in mystic expectation 
(From its wild source far .apart) 



Until it be filled with thee, — 
With the full-orbed light of thee, — 
O beloved as thou art ! 
With the aoft sad smile that 

flashes 
Underneath thy long dark lashes ; 
And thy floating raven hair 
From its wreathe'd pearls let slip ; 
And tny breath, like balmy air ; 
And tliy warm wet rosy lip, 
With my first kiss lingering there; 
Its sweet secret unreveaied, — 
Sealed by me, to me unsealed ; 
And . . . but, ah ! she lies asleep 
In j'on gray stone castle-keep, 
On her lids the happy tear ; 
And alone I linger liere ; 
And to-morrow morn the fight ; 
And . . . ah, me ! to-morrow 

night ? 

Here she bi-ake, trembling, off ; and 

on the lute. 
Yet vibrating tlirough its melodious 

nerves, 
A great tear plashed and tinkled. 

For a while 
She sat and mused ; and, heavily, 

drop liy drop, 
Her tears fell down ; then through 

them a slow smile 
Stole, full of April-sweetness ; and 

she sang — 
— It was a sort of ballad of the sea : 
A song of weather-beaten mariners, 
Gray-iieaded men that had survived 

all winds 
And held a perilous sport among 

the waves. 
Who yet sang on with hearts as bold 

as when 
They cleared their native harbor 

with a shout, 
And lifted golden anchors in the 

sun. 

Merrily, merrily drove our barks, — 
Merrily up from the morning beach! 
And the brine broke under her 

prows in sparks ; 
For a spirit sat high at the helm of 

each. 



MINOR POEMS. 



449 



Wo sailed all day ; and, when day 

was done, 
Steered after the wake of the sunken 

sun, 
For we meant to follow hhu out of 

reach 
Till the golden dawn was again 

begun. 

With lifted oars, with shout and 

song. 
Merry mariners all were we ! 
Every heart beat stout and strong. 
Through all the world you would 

not see. 
Though you should journey wide 

n'ul long, 
A ('111 e iiir company. 
And \\ here, the echoing creeks 

among, 
Merrily, steadily. 

From bay to bay our barks did fall. 
You might hear us singing, one and 

all, 
A song of the mighty sea. 
But, just at twilighi. down the rocks 
Dim forms trooj^ed fast, and clearer 

grew : 
For out upon the sea-sand came 
The island-people, whom we knew, 
And called us : — girls with glowing 

locks ; 
And sunburnt boys that tend the 

herd 
Far up the vale ; gray elders too 
With silver beards : — their cries we 

heard : 
They called us, each one by his 

name. 

"Could ye not wait a little while," 
We heard them sing, " for all our 

sakes ? 
A little while, in this old isle," 
They sung, " among the silver lakes? 
For here," they sung, " from horn 

to horn 
Of flowery bays the land is fair : 
The hillside glows with grapes : the 

corn 
Grows golden in the vale down there. 
29 



Our maids are sad for you," they 

sung : 
"Against the field no sickle falls : 
Upon the trees our harps are hung : 
Our doors are void : and in the 

stalls 
The little foxes nest ; among 
The herd-roved hills no shepherd 

calls : 
Your brethren mourn for you," they 

sung. 
" Here weeji your wives : here jjassed 

your lives 
Among the vines, when you were 

• young : 
Here dwell your sires : your house- 
hold fires 
Grow cold. Keturn ! Return I" they 

sung. 

Then each one saw his kinsman 

stand 
Upon the shore, and wave his hand: 
And each grew sad. But still we 

sung 
Our ocean-chorus bold and clear ; 
And still upon our oars we hung, 
Ar.d held our course with steadfast 

cheer. 
" For Ave are bound for distant 

shores," 
We cried, and faster swept our oars: 
" We pine to see the faces there 
Of men whose deeds we heard long 

since, 
Who haunt our dreams : gray he- 
roes : kings 
Whose fame the wandering minstrel 

sings : 
And maidens, too, more fair than 

ours, 
Witli deeper eyes and softer liair. 
Like hers that left her island bowers 
To wed the sullen Cornish Prince 
Who keeps his court upon the hill 
By the gray coasts of Tyntagill, 
A.nd each, before he dies, must gain 
Some fairy-land across the main." 

But still " return, beloved, return I " 
The shnple island-people sung : 



45 <3 



MINOR POEMS. 



And still each mariner's heart did 

burn, 
As each liis kinsman could discern, 
Tliose dim green rocks among. 

*' O'er you the rough sea-blasts will 

blow," 
They sung, "while here the skies 

are fair : 
Our paths are through the fields we 

know : 
And yours you know not where." 

But we waved our hands . . . "fare- 
well ! farewell ! '' 
We cried ..." our white sails flap 

the mast : 
Our course is set : our oars are wet : 
One day," we cried, " is nearly past: 
One day at sea ! Farewell ! fare- 
well ! 
No more with you we now may 
dwell!" 

And the next day we were driving 

free 
(With never a sail in sight) 
Over the face of the mighty sea. 
And we counted the stars next night 
Rise over us by two and three 
With melancholy light : 
A grave-eyed, earnest company, — 
And all round the salt foam white ! 

With this, she ceased, and sighed 
..." though I were far, 

I know yon moated iris would not 
shed 

His purple crown : yon clover-field 
would ripple 

As nierry in the waving wind as 
now : 

As soft the Spring down this bare 
hill would steal, 

And in the vale below fling all lier 
flowei's : 

Each year the wet primroses star the 
woods : 

And violets muffle the sharp rivu- 
lets : 

Round this lone casement's solitary 
panes 



The wandering ivy move and mount 

each year : 
Each year the red wheat gleam near 

river-banks : 

While, ah, with each my memory 

frcmi the hearts 
Of men would fade, and from their 

lips my name. 
O which were best — the wide, the 

windy sea, 
With golden gleams of undiscovered 

lands, 
Odors, and murmurs — or the i^lacid 

Port, 
From wanton winds, from scornful 

waves secure, 
Under the old, green, happy hills of 

home ? " 
She sat forlorn, and pondered. Night 

was near, 
And, marshalling o'er the hills her 

d(nvy camps, 
Came down the outposts of the sen- 
tinel stars. 
All in the owlet light she sat forlorn. 

Now hostel, hall, and grange, that 

eve were crammed : 
The town being choked to bm'Sting 

of the gates : 
For there the King yet lay with all 

his Earls, 
And the Round Table, numbering 

all save one. 

On many a curving terrace which 

o'erhung 
The long gray river, swan- like, 

through the green 
Of quaintest yews, moved, pacing 

stately by. 
The lovely ladies of King Arthur's 

court. 
Sighing, she eyed them from that 

lonely keep. 

The Dragon-banners o'er the turrets 

drooped, 
The heavy twilight hanging in their 

fr)lds. 



MINOR POEMS. 



451 



And now and then, from posterns in 

the wall 
The knights stole, lingering for some 

last Goodnight, 
Whispered or sighed through closing 

lattices ; 
Or paused with reverence of bending 

plumes, 
And lips on jewelled fingers gayly 

prest. 
The silver cressets shone from pane 

to pane : 
And tapers flitted by with flitting 

forms : 
Clanged the dark streets with clash 

of iron heels : 
Or fell a sound of coits in clattering 

courts, 
And drowsy horse-boys singing in 

the straw. 

These noises floated upward. And 

within. 
From the great Hall, forever and 

anon, 
Brake gusts of revel ; snatches of 

wild song. 
And laughter ; where her sire among 

his men 
Caroused between tlie twilight and 

the dark. 
The silence round about her where 

she sat, 
Vext in itself, grew sadder for the 

sound. 
, She closed her eyes : before them 

seemed to float 
A dream of lighted revels, — dance 

and song 
InGuenvcr's palace : gorgeous tour- 
naments ; 
And rows of glittering eyes about 

the Queen 
(Like stars in galaxies around the 

moon), 
That sparkled recognition down be- 
low. 
Where rode the Kniglits amort with 

lance and piame ; 
And each his lady's sleeve upon his 

helm: 



Murmuring ..." none ride for me. 

Am I not fair. 
Whom men call the White Flower 

of Astolat?" 

Far, far without, the wild gray mar- 
is h spread, 

A heron startled from the pools, and 
flapped 

The water from his wings, and 
skirred away. 

The last long limit of the dying light 

Dropped, all on fii-e, behind an iron 
cloud : 

And, here and there, through some 
wild chasm of blue. 

Tumbled a stai-. The mist upon the 
fens 

Thickened. A billowy opal grew i' 
the crofts. 

Fed on the land, and sucked into 
itself 

Paling and park, close copse and 
bushless down. 

Changing the world for Fairies. 

Then the moon 

In the low east, unprisoned from 
black bars 

Of stagnant fog (a white light, 
wrought to the full. 

Summed in a perfect orb) rose sud- 
denly up 

Upon the silence witli a great siu*- 
prise. 

And took the inert landscape un- 
awares. 

White, white, the snaky river : darl 

the banks: 
And dark the folding distance, wherti 

her eyes 
Were wildly turned, as though the 

whole world lay 
111 that far blackness over Carlyel, 
There she espied Sir Laiuicelot, as 

he rode 
His coal-black courser downward 

from afar, 
For all his armor glittered as he 

went. 
And showed like silver : and his 

mighty shield, 



45- 



MINOR POEMS. 



By dint of knightly combat haclit and 

worn, 
Looked like some cracked and frozen 

moon tliat hangs 
By night o'er Baltic headlands all 

alone. 

TO . 

As, in lone fairy-lands, up some rich 

shelf 
Of golden sand the wild wave moan- 

i»giy 

Heaps its unvalued sea-wealth, weed 

and gem, 
Then creeps back slow into the salt 

sad sea : 
So from my life's new searched deeps 

to thee, 
Beloved, I cast these weed-flowers. 

iSmile on them. 
More than they mean I know not to 

express. 
So I shrink back into my old sad 

self, 
Far from all words where love lies 

fathomless. 

QUEEX GUENEVERE. 

Thence, up the sea-green floor, 

among th.' stems 
Of mighty columns whose unmeas- 
ured shades 
From aisle to aisle, unheeded hi the 

sun. 
Moved without soiuid, I, following 

all alone 
A strange desire that drew me like a 

hand. 
Came unawares upon the Queen. 

She sat 
In a great silence, which her beauty 

filled 
Full to the heart of it, on a black 

chair 
Mailed all about with sullen gems, 

and crusts 
Of sultry blazonry. Her face was 

bowed, 
A pause of slumbrous beauty, o'er 

the light 



Of some delicious thought new-risen 

above 
The deeps of passion. Round her 

stately head 
A single circlet of the red gold fine 
Burned free, from which, on either 

side streamed down 
Twilights of her soft hair, from neck 

to foot. [is, 

Green was her kirtle as the emerolde 
And stiff from hem to hem with 

seams of stones 
Beyond all value ; which, from left 

to right 
Disparting, half revealed the snowy 

gleam 
Of a white robe of spotless samite 

pure. 
And from the soft repression of her 

zone. 
Which like a light hand on a lute- 
string pressed 
Harmony from its touch, flowed 

warmly back 
The bounteous outliTies of a glowing 

grace, 
Nor yet outflowed sweet laws of 

loveliness. 

Then did I feel as one who, much 

perpjext. 
Led by strange legends and the light 

of stai's 
0\'er long regions of the midnight 

sand 
Beyond the red tract of the Pyra- 
mids, 
Is suddenly drawn to look upon the 

sky 
From sense of unfamiliar light, and 

sees, 
Revealed against the constellated 

cope 
The great cross of the South. 

The chamber round 
Was dropt with arras gi'een ; and I 

could hear. 
In courts far off, a minstrel praising 

May, 
Who sang . . . Si douce, si douce 

est la Margarete ! 



MINOR POEMS. 



453 



To a faint lute. Upon the window- 
sill, 

Hard by a latoun bowl that blazed i' 
the sun 

Perched a strange fowl, a Falcon 
Peregrine ; 

With all his feathers piift for pride, 
and all 

His courage glittering outward in his 
eye ; 

For he had flown from far, athwart 
strange lands, 

And o'er the light of many a setting 
sun, 

Lured by his love (such sovereignty 
of old 

Had Beauty in all coasts of Chris- 
tendom I) 

To look into the great eyes of the 
Queen, 

THE NEGLECTED HEAKT. 

This heart, you would not have, 
I laid up in a grave 
Of song : with love enwound it ; 
And set sweet fancies blowing round 

it. 
Then I to others gave it ; 
Because you would not have it. 
'•See you keep it well," I said ; 
"This heart's sleeping — is not dead; 
But will wake some future day : 
See you keep it while you may." 

All great Sorrows in the world, — 
Some with crowns upon their heads, 
And in regal pm-ple furled ; 
Some with rosaries and beads ; 
Some with lips of scorning, curled 
At false Fortune ; some, in weeds 
Of mourning and of widowhood, 
Standing tearful and apart, — 
Each one in his several mood, 
Came to take my heait. 

Then in holy ground they set it ; 
With melodious weepings wet it 
And revered it as they found it, 
With wild fancies blowing round it. 



j And this heart (you would not have) 

I Being not dead, though iu the grave, 

I Worked miracles and marvels 

j strange. 

And healed many maladies : 
Giving sight to sealed-up eyes. 
And legs to lame men sick for change. 

i 

The fame of it grew great and i 

greater. ; 

Then said you, " Ah, what's the | 

I matter ? \ 

How hath this heart I would not 

i take, 

This weak heart a child might 

I break — 

This poor, foolish heart of his — 
Since won worship such as this ? " 

You bethought youthen . . . "Ah 

me, 
Wliat if this heart, I did not choose 
To retain, hath found the key 
Of the kingdom ? and I lose 
A great power ? Me he gave it : 
Mine the right, and I will have it." 

Ah, too late ! For crowds exclaimed, 
" Ours it is : and hath been claimed. 
Jloreover, where it lies, the spot 
Is holy ground : so enter not. 
None but men of mournful mind,— 
Men to darkened days resigned ; 
Equal scorn of Saint and Devil ; 
Poor and outcast ; halt and blind ; 
Exiles from Life's golden revel ; 
Gnawing at the bitter rind 
Of old griefs ; or else, confined 
In proud cares, to serve and grind, — 
May enter : whom this heart shall 

cure. 
But go thou by : thou art not poor : 
Nor defrauded of thy lot : 
Bless thyself : but enter not !" 

APPEARANCES. 

Well, you have learned to smile. 
And no one looks for traces 
Of tears about your eyes. 
Your face is like most faces. 
And who will ask, meanwhile, 
If your face your heart belies ? 



454 



MINOR POEMS. 



Are you happy ? You look so. 
Well, I wish you what you seem. 
Happy persons sleep so light ! 
In your sleep you never dream '? 
But who would care to know 
What dreams you dreamed last 
night ? 

HOW THE SONG WAS MADE. 

I SAT low down, at midnight, in a 
vale 
Mysterious with the silence of blue 
pines : 
White-cloven by a snaky river-tail, 
Uncoiled from tangled wefts of sil- 
ver twines. 

Out of a crumbling castle, on a spike 
Of splintered rock, a mile of 
changeless shade 
<; urged half the landscape. Down a 
dismal dike 
Of black hills the sluiced moon- 
beams sireamed, and stayed. 

The world lay like a poet in a swoon, 
When God is on him, filled with 
Heaven, all through, — 
A dim face full of dreams turned to 
the moon, 
With mild lips moist in melan- 
choly dew. 

I plucked blue nuigwort, livid man- 
drakes, balls 
Of blossomed nightshade, heads of 
hemlock, long 
White grasses, grown in oozy inter- 
vals 
Of marsh, to make ingredients for 
a song : 

A. song of mourning to embalm the 
Past,— 
The corpse-cold Past, — that it 
should not decay , 
5ut in dark vaults of memory, to the 
last, 
Enduie unchanged ; for iu some 
future day 



I will bring my new love to look at 
it 
(Laying aside her gay robes for a 
moment) 
That, seeing what love came to, she 
may sit 
Silent awhile, and muse, but make 
no comment. 

EETROSPECTIONS. 

To-night she will dance at tlie 
palace. 
With the diamonds in lier hair : 
And the Piince M'ill praise her 
beauty — 
The loveliest lady there ! 

But tones, at times, in the music 

Will bring back forgotten things : 
And her heart will fail lier some- 
times, 
Wlien her beauty is praised at the 
King's. 

There sits in liis silent chamber 
A stern and sorrowful man : 

But a strange sweet di'eam comes to 
him, 
^Vliile the lamp is burning wan, 

Of a sunset among the vineyards 

In a lone and lovely land. 
And a maiden standing near him. 

With fresh wild- flowers m her 
hand. 

THY VOICE ACROSS MY SPIRIT 
FALLS. 

Thy voice across my spirit falls 

Like some spent sea-wind through 
dim halls 

Of ocean-king's, left bare and wide 

(Green floors o'er which the sea- 
weed crawls !) 

Where once, long since, in festal 
pride 

Some Chief, who roved and ruled the 
tide. 

Among his brethren reigned and 
died. 



I dare not meet thine eyes ; for so, 
In gazing there, I seem once more 
To lapse away tlirongh days of yore 
To homes wliere laugh and song is ' 

o'er, 
Whose inmates each went long ago — ' 

Like some lost soul, that keeps the 

semblance 
On its brow of ancient grace 
Not all faded, wandering back 1 

To silent chambers, in the track ! 
Of the twilight, from the Place j 

Of retributive Remembrance. 
Ah, turn aside those eyes again ! 
Their light has less of joy than pain. 
We are not now what we were then. 

THE RUINED PALACE. 

BPkOKex are the Palace windows : 

Rotting is the Palace floor. 
The damp wind lifts the arras, 

And swings the creaking door ; 
But it only startles the white owl 

From his perch on a monarch's 
throne, 
And the rat that was gnawing the 
harp-strings 

A Queen once plaj'ed upon. 

Dare you linger here at midnight 

Alone, when the wind is about, 
And the bat, and the newt, and the 
viper, 

And the creeping things come out? 
Beware of these ghostly chambers ! 

Search not what my heart hath 
been. 
Lest you find a phantom sitting 

Where once there sat a Queen. 

A VISION OF VIRGINS. 
I HAD a vision of the night. 

It seemed 
There was a long red tract of barren 

land, 
Blockt in by black hills, where a 

half-moon dreamed 



Of morn, and whitened. 

Drifts of dry brown sand, 

This way and that, were heapt be- 
low • and flats 

Of water : — glaring shallows, where 
strange bats 

Came and went, and moths flick- 
ered. 

To the right 

A dusty road that crept along the 
waste 

Like a white snake : and, farther up, 
I traced 

The shadow of a gi'eat house, far in 
sight : 

A hundred casements all ablaze 
with light : 

And forms that flit athw'art them as 
in haste : 

And a slow music, such as some- 
times kings 

Command at mighty revels, softly 
sent 

From viol, and flute, and tahor, and 
the strings 

Of many a sweet and slumbrous in- 
strument 

That wound into the mute heail of 
the night 

Out of that distance. 

Then I could perceive 

A glory pouring through an open 
door. 

And in the light five Avomen. I be- 
lieve 

They wore white vestments, all of 
them. They were 

Quite calm ; and each still face un- 
earthly fair. 

Unearthly quiet. So like statues 
all. 

Waiting they stood without that 
lighted hall ; ) 

And in iheir hands, like a blue star, 
they held 

Each one a silver lamp. 

Then I beheld 

A shadow in the doorway. And One 
came 

Crowned for a feast. I could not 
see the Face. 



45 6 



MIiVOR POEMS. 



The Form was not all Imni an. As 

the flame 
Streanieel over it, a presence took 

the phice 
With awe. 
He, turning, took them hy the 

hand, 
And led them each up the white 

stairway, and 
The door closed. 



At that moment the moon dipped 
Behind a rag of purple vapor, ript 
Oft' a great cloud, some dead wind, 

ere it spent 
Its last breath, had blown open, and 

so rent 
You saw behhid blue pools of light, 

and there 
A wild star swimming in the lurid 
air. 

! The dream Mas darkened. And a 
sense of loss 
Fell like a nightmare on the land : 

because 
The moon yet lingered in her cloud- 
eclipse. 
Then, in the dark, swelled sullenly 

across 
The waste a wail of women. 

Her blue lips 

j The moon drew up out of the cloud. 

I Again 

■ I had a vision on that midnight 

plain. 

Five women : and the beauty of 
despair 
J Upon theh- faces : locks of wild wet 
j hair, 

I Clammy with anguish, wandered low 
I and loose 

: O'er their bare breasts, that seemed 
too filled with trouble 
To feel tlie damp crawl of the mid- 
night dews 
That ti'lckied down them. One was 

bent half double, 
A dismayed heap, that hung o'er 
the last spark 



Of a lamp slowly dying. As she 

blew 
The dull light redder, and the dry 

wick Hew 
In crinnbling sparkles all about the 

dark, 
1 saw a light of horror in her eyes ; 
X wild light on her flusht cheek ; a 

wild white 
On her dry lips; an agony of surprise 
Feai'fuUy fair. 

The ianii) dropped. From my sight 
She fell into the dark. 

Beside her. sat 
One V. ithout motion : and her stern 

face flat 
Against the dark sky. 

One, as still as death. 
Hollowed her bauds about her lamp. 

for fear 
Some motion of the midnight, or her 

breath. 
Should fan out the last flicker. Rosy- 
clear 
The light oozed, through her fingers, 

o'er her face. 
There was a ruined beauty hovering 

there 
Over deep pain, and, dasht with 

lurid grace 
A waning bloom. 

The light grew dim and blear : 
And she, too, slowly darkened in her 

place. 
Another, with her white hands hotly 

lockt 
About her damp knees, muttering 

madness, I'ocked 
Forward and backward. But at last 

she stopped. 
And her dark head upon her bosom 

dropped 
Motionless. 

Then one rose up with a cry 
To the great moon ; and stretched a 

wratliful arm 
Of wild expostulation to the sky. 
Murmuring, " Tbese earth-lamps fail 

us ! and what barni ? 
Does not the moon shine ? Let us 

rise and haste 



MINOR POEMS. 



457 



To meet the Bridegroom yonder o'er 

the waste ! 
For now I seem to catch once more 

the tone 
Of viols on the night. 'Twere better 

done, 
At worst, to perish near the golden 

gate, 
And fall in sight of glory one by one, 
Than here all night upon the wild, 

to wait 
Uncertain ills. A^ay ! the hour is 

late I" 

Again the moon dipped. 

I could see no more. 
Not the least gleam of light did 
heaven afford. 

At last, I heard a knocking on a door, 
And some one crying, ''Ui^en to us, 

Lord !" 
There was an awful pause. 

I heard my heart 
Beat. 
Then a Voice — " I know you not. 
Depart." 
I caught, within, a glimpse of glory. 

' And 
The door closed. 

Still in darkness dreamed the land. 
I could not see those women. Not 

a breath ! 
Darkness, and awe : a darkness more 

than death. 
The darkness took them. ***** 



LEOLINE. 

In the molten-golden moonlight, 

In the deep grass warm and dry, 
We watched the fire-fly rise and 
swim 

In floating sparkles by. 
All night the heaits of nightingales, 

S:jng-sleei)ing, slumbrous leaves, 
Flowed to us in the shadow there 

Below the cottage-eaves. 

We sang our songs together 
Till the stars shook in the skies. 



We spoke — we spoke of common 

things. 
Yet the tears were in our eyes. 
And my hand, — I know it trembled 
To each light warm touch of thine. 
But we were friends, and only 
friends. 
My sweet friend, Leoline ! 

How large the white moon looked, 
Dear I 
There has not ever been 
Since those old nights the same great 
light 
In the moons which I have seen. 
I often wonder, when I think, 
If you have thought so too. 
And tlie moonlight has grown dim- 
mer. Dear, 
Than it used to be to you. 

And sometimes, when the warm 
west-wind 
Comes faint across the sea, 
It seems that you have breathed on 
it, 
So sweet it comes to me : 
And sometimes, when the long light 
wanes 
In one deep crimson line, 
I muse, " and does she watch it too. 
Far off, sweet Leoline ?" 

And often, leaning all day long 

My head upon my hands, 
My iieart aches for the vanisht time 

In the far fair foreign lands : 
Thinking sadly — " Is she happy ? 

Has she tears for those old hours ? 
And the cottage in tlie starlight ? 

And the songs among the flow-, 
ers?" 

One night we sat below the porch. 

And out in that warm air. 
Afire-fly, like a dying star. 

Fell tangled in her hair ; 
But I kissed him lightly off again. 

And he glittered up tlie vine. 
And died into the darkness 

For the love of Leoline ! 



4S8 



MINOR POEMS. 



Between two songs of Petrarch 

I've a purple rose-leaf prest, 
More sweet than eoniniou rose- 
leaves, 

For it once lay in her breast. 
When she gave me that her eyes 
were wet, 

The rose was full of dew. 
Th(^ rose is withered long ago ; 

The page is blistered too. 

There's a blue flower in my garden, 

The bee loves more than all : 
The bee and I, we love it both, 

Though it is frail and small. 
She loved it too — long, long ago : 

Her love was less tlian mine. 
Still we are friends, but only 
friends, 

My lost love, Leoline ! 

SPKING AND WINTER. 

The world bud^ every year : 
But the heart just once, and when 

The blossom falls off sere 
No new blossom conies again. 

Ah, the rose goes with the wind : 

But the thorns remain behind. 

Was it well in him, if he 
[ Felt not love, to speak of love so? 
I If he still unmoved must be. 

Was it nobly sought to move so ? 
— Pluck the flower, and yet not wear 

it- 
Spurn, despise it, yet not spare it ? 

Need he say that I was fair. 
With such uicaning in his tone, 

Just to speak of one whose liair 
Had the same tinge as my own ? 

Pluck my life up, root and bloom. 

Just to 1-1 mt it on her tomb ? 

And she'd scarce so fair a face 
(So he used to say) as mine : 

And her form had far less grace : 
And her brow was far less fine : 

But 'twas just that he loved then 

More than he can love again. 



■\Vliy, if Beauty could not bind him. 
Need he praise me, speaking low : 

Use my face just to remind him 
How no face could please him 
now ? 

Why, if loving could not move him 

Did he teach me still to love him ? 

And he said my eyes were bright. 
But his own, he said, were dim : 

And my hand, he said, was white. 
But what was that to him ? 

" For," he said, " in gazing at you 

I seem gazing at a statue." 

" Yes," he said, '' he had grown 
wise now : 

He had suffered much of yore : 
But, a fair face to his eyes now. 

Was a fair face, and no more. 
Yet the anguish and the bliss. 
And the dream too, had been his." 

Then, nhy talk of " lost romances " 

Being " sick of sentiment ! " 
And what meant those tones and 
glances 
If real love Avas never neant ? 
Why, if his own youth were with- 
ered, 
Must mine also have been gathered? 

Wliy those words a thought too 
tender 
For the commonplaces spoken ? 

Looks whose meaning seemed to 
. render 
Help to words when speech came 
broken ? 

Why so late in July moonlight 

Just to say what's said by noon- 
light ? 

And why praise my youth for glad- 
ness, 
Keeping something in his smile 
Which tui-ned all my youth to sad- 
ness, 
He still smiling all the while ? 
Since, when so my youth was over 
He said — " Seek some yovmger 
lover !" 



MIXOR POEMS. 



459 



" For the world buds once a year, 
But the heart just once," he said. 

True ! ... so now that Spring is 
here 
All luy flowers, like his, are dead. 

And the rose drops in the wind. 

But the thorns remain behind. 



KIXG HERMAXDIAZ. 

THE^', standing by the shore, I saw 

tlie moon 
Change hue, and dwindle in the 

west, as when 
Warm looks fade inward out of dying 

eyes. 
And the dim sea began to moan. 

I knew 
My hour had come, and to the bark 

I went. 
Still were the stately decks, and hung 

with silk 
Of stole'd crimson : at the mast-head 

burned 
A steadfast lire with influence like a 

star. 
And underntath a couch of gold. I 
loosed 
J The dripping chain. There was not 
p any wind : 

r But all at once the magic sails began 
\ To belly and heave, and like a bat 
I that wakes 

\ And flits by night, beneath her 
I swarthy wings 

I The black ship rocked and moved. 
jj I heard anon 

5 A humming in the cordage and a 
sound 
Like bees in siunmer, and the bark 
M'ent on, 
I And on, and on, until at last the 
\. world 

\ "Was rolled away and folded out of 
: sight. 

And I was all alone on the great sea. 
\ There a deep awe fell on my spirit. 
My wound 
Began to bite. I, gazing round, be- 
held 
A lady sitting silent at the helm, 



A woman white as death, and fair as 

dreams. 
I would have asked her " Whitlicr 

do we sail ? " 
And "how?" but that my fear 

clung at my heart. 
And held me still. She, answering 

my doubt, 
Said slowly, " To the Isle of Ava- 

lon." 

And straightway we were nigh a 

strand all gold. 
That glittered in the moon between 

the dusk 
Of hanging bowers made rich with 

blooms and bahns, 
From which fuiut gusts came to me; 

and I heai'd 
A sound of lutes among the vales, 

and songs 
And voices faint like voices through 

a dream 
That said or seemed to say, "Hail, 

Hermandiaz ! " 

SONG. 
Is" the warm, black mill-pool wink- 

The fii-jt doubtful star shines blue: 
And alone here I lie thinking 
O such happy thoughts of you ! 

Up the porch the roses clamber, 
And the flowers we sowed last 
June ; 

And the casement of your chamber 
Shines between them to the moon. 

Look out. Love ! fling wide the lat- 
tice : 

Wind the red rose in your hair. 
And the little white clematis 

Which I plucked for you to wear : 

Or come down, and let me hear you 
Singing in the scented grass. 

Through tall cowslips nodding near 
you, 
Jusf to touch you as you pass 



460 



MINOR POEMS. 



For, where you pass, the air 

Witli warm hints of love grows 
wise : 

You — tlie dew on your dim Iiair, 
And the smile in your soft eyes ! 

From the hayfield comes your 
brother : 
There your sisters stand together, 
Singing clear to one another 
Through the dark blue summer 
weather, 

And the maid the latch is clinking 
As she lets her lover through : 

But alone. Love, I lie thinking 
O such tender thoughts of you ! 



THE SWALLOW. 

O SWALLOW chirping in the spark- 
ling eves, 
Why hast thou left far south thy 
fairy homes. 
To build between these drenched 
April leaves. 
And sing me songs of Spring be- 
fore it comes ? 

Too soon thou singest ! Yon black 

stubborn thorn 
Bursts not a bud : the sneaping 

wind drifts on. 
She that once flung thee crumbs, 

and in the morn 
Sang from the lattice where thou 

sing'st, is gone. 
Here is no Spring. Thy flight yet 

farther follow. 
Fly off, vain swallow ! 

Thou com'st to mock me with re- 
membered things. 
I love thee not, O bird for me too 
gay. 

That which I want thou hast, — the 
gift of wings : 
Grief— which I have— thou hast 
not. Fly away ! 

What hath my roof for thee ? My 
cold dark roof, 



Beneath whose weeping thatch 
thine eggs will freeze ! 
Summer will halt not here, so keep 
aloof. 
Others are gone ; go thou. In those 
wet trees 
I see no Spring, though thou still 

singest of it. 
Fare hence, false prophet ! 

CONTEABAND. 

A HEAP of low, dark, rocky coast, 
Where the blue-black sea sleeps 
smooth and even : 
And the sun, just over the reefs at 
most, 
In the amber part of a pale blue 
heaven : 

A village as«eep below the pines. 
Hid up the gray shore from the 
low slow sun : 
And a maiden that lingers among 
the vines. 
With her feet in the dews, and her 
locks undone : 

The half-moon melting out of the 
sky ; 
And, just to be seen still, a star 
here, a star there, 
Faint, high up in the heart of the 
heaven ; so high 
And so faint, you can scarcely be 
sure that they are there. 

And one of tliat small, black, raking 
craft ; 
Two swivel guns on a round deck 
handy ; 
And a great sloop sail with the wind 
abaft ; 
And four brown thieves round a 
cask of brandy. 

That's my life, as I left it last. 
And what it may be henceforth I 
know not. 
But all that I keep of the merry 
Past 
Are trifles like these, which I care 
to show not : — 



MmOR POEMS. 



461 



A leathern flask, and a necklace of 
pearl ; 
These rusty pistols, this tattered 
chart, Friend, 
And the soft dark half of a raven 
curl ; 
And, at evening, the t^iought of a 
true, true heart, Friend. 

EVEXING. 

Already evening ! In the duskiest 
nook 
Of yon dusk corner, under the 

Death's-head, 
Between the alembecs, thrust tliis 
legended. 
And iron-bound, and melancholy 

book. 
For I will read no longei-. The loud 
brook 
Shelves his sharp light up shallow 

banks thin-spread ; 
The slunibi'ous west grows slowly 
red, and red : 
Up from the ripened corn her silver 
hook 
The moon is lifting : and deli- 
ciously 
Along th(» warm blue hills the day 
dechnes : 
The first star brightens Mhile she 

waits for me," 
And round her swelling heart the 
zone grows tight : 
Musing, half-sad, in her soft hair 
slie twines 
The white rose, whispering,- "he 
will come to-night ! " 



ADOX. 

I WILL not weep for Adon ! 
I will not waste my breath to draw 

thick sighs 
For Spring's dead greenness. All 

the orient skies 
Are huslit, aiid breathing out a 

bright surprise 
Kound morning's marshalling star : 

Rise, Eos, rise I 



Day's dazzling spears are up : the 

faint stars fade on 
The white hills, — cold, like Adon ! 

O'er crag, and spar, and splinter 
Break down, and roll the amber mist, 

stern light. 
The black pines dream of dawn. 

The skirts of night 
Are ravelled in the East. And 

planted bright 
In heaven, the roots of ice shine, 
sharp and white. 
In frozen ray, and spar, and spike, 

and splinter. 
Within me and without, all's Win- 
ter. 

Why should I weep for Adon ? 
Am I, because the sweet Past is no 

more. 
Dead, as the leaves upon the graves 

of yore ? 
I will breathe boldly, though the air 

be frore 
With freezing fire. Life still beats 
at the core 
Of the world's heart, though Death 

his awe hath laid on 
This dumb white corpse of Adon. 



THE PROPHET. 

When the East lightens with strange 

hints of morn. 
The first tinge of the growing glory 

takes 
The cold crown of some husht high 

alp foilorn. 
While yet o'er vales below the dark 

is spread. 
Even so the dawning Age, in silence, 

breaks, 
O solitary soul, on thy still head : 
And we, that watch below with rev- 

ercTit fear. 
Seeing thee crowned, do know that 

day is near. 



462 



MINOR POEMS. 



WEALTH. 

Was it not enough to dream the day 
to death 
Grandly ? and finely feed on faint 
perfumes '} 
Between the heavy lilacs draw thick 
breath, 
While the noon hummed from 
gloAving citron-glooms ? 

Or walk with Morning in these 
dewy bowers, 
'Mid sheaved lilies, and the moth- 
loved lips 
Of purple asters, bearded flat sun- 
liowers. 
And milk-white crumpled pinks 
with blood i' the tips '? 

But I must also, gazing upon thee, 
Pine with delicious pain, and 
subtle smart, 
Till I felt heavy immortality, 
Laden witii looks of thine, weigh 
on my heart ! 



WANT. 

You swore you loved me all last 
June : 
And now December's come and 
gone. 
The Summer went with you — too 
soon. 
The Winter goes — alone. 

Next Spring the leaves will all be 
be green : 
But love like ours, once turned to 
pain, 
Can be no more Avliat it hath been, 
Tliough roses bloom again. 

Return, return the unvalued wealth 
I gave ! which scarcely profits 

y(;U— 

The heart's lost youth — the soul's 
lost health — 
111 vain ! . . . false friend, adieu ! 



I keep one faded violet 

Of all once ours, — you left no 
more. 
What I have lost I may forget, 

But you cannot restore; 

A BIRD AT SUNSET. 

Wild bird, that wingest wide the 
glimmering moors. 
Whither, by belts of yellowing 
woods away ? 
With pausing sunset thy wild heart 
allures 
Deep into dying day ? 

Would that my heart, on wings like 
thine, could pass 
Where stars their light in rosy re- 
gions lose, — 
A happy shadow o'er the warm 
brown grass, 
Falling witii falling dews ! 

Hast thou, like me, some true-love 
of thine own. 
In fairy lands beyond the utmost 
seas ; 
Who there, unsolaced, yearns for 
thee alone, 
And sings to silent trees ? 

O tell that woodbird that the Sum- 
mer grieves. 
And the suns darken and the days 
grow cold ; 
And, tell her, love will fade with fad- 
ing leaves. 
And cease in common mould. 

Fly from the winter of the world to 
her ! 
Fly, happy bird ! I follow in thy 
flight, 
Till thou art lost o'er yonder fringe 
of fir 
In baths of crimson light. 

My love is dying far away from me. 
She sits and saddens in the fading 
west. 



MTNOR POEMS. 



463 



For lier I mourn all day, and pine 
to be 
At night upon her breast. . 



IN TRAVEL. 

Now our white sail flutters down : 
Now it broadly takes the breeze : 
Now the wharves upon the town, 
Lessening, leave us by degrees. 
Blithely blows the morning, shaking 
On your cheek ihe loosened curls : 
Round our prow the cleft wave, 

breaking, 
Tuml)les off in heape'd pearls. 
Which in forks of foam unite, 
And run seething out to sea, 
Where o'er gleams of briny light, 
Dip the dancing gulls in glee. 
Now the mountain serpentiixe 
Slips out many a snaky line 
Down the dark blue ocean-spine. 
From the boatside, while we pass, 
I can see, as in a glass. 
Pirates on the flat sea-sand, 
Caiousing ere they put from land ; 
And the purple-pointed crests 
Of hills whereon the morning rests 
Whose ethei'eal vivid peaks 
Glimmer in the lucid creeks. 
Now these wind away ; and now 
Hamlets up the mountain-hrow 
Peep and peer from roof to roof ; 
And gray castle-walls aloof 
O'er wide vineyards jusl in grape, 
From whose serfs old Barons held 
Tax and td in feudal eld. 
Creep out of the uncoiling cape. 
Now the long low layer of mist 
A slow trouble rolls and lifts, 
With a broken billowy motion. 
From the rocks and from the rifts, 
Laying bare, just here and there. 
Black stone-pines, at morn dew-kist 
By salt winds from bound to bound 
Of the great sea freshening round ; 
Wattled folds on bleak brown downs 
Sloping higli o'er sleepy towns ; 
Lengths of shore and breadths of 

ocean. 



Love, lean here upon my shoulder, 
And look yonder, love, with me : 
Now I think that I can see 
In the merry market-places 
SLidden warmths of sunny faces : 
Many a I-3vely laughing maiden 
Bearing on her loose dark locks 
Rich fruit-baskets heavy-laden. 
In and out among the rocks, 
Knowing not that we behold- her, 
Now, love, tell me, can you hear, 
Growing nearer, and more near, 
Sound of song, and plash of oar. 
From wild bays, and inlets hoar. 
While above yon isles afar 
Ghostlike sinks last night's last star? 

CHANGES. 
Whom first we love, you know, we 
seldom wed. 
Time rules us all. And Life, in- 
deed, is not 
The thing ^\ e planned it out ere hope 
was dead. 
And then, we women cannot 
choose our lot. 

Much must be borne which it is hard 
to bear : 
Much given away which it were 
sweet to keep. 
God help us all ! who need, indeed, 
His care. 
And yet, I know, the Shepherd 
loves His sheep. 

My little boy begins to babble now 
Upon my knee his earliest infant 
prayer. 
He has his father's eager eyes, I 
know. 
And, they say too, his mother's 
sunny hair. 

But when he sleeps and smiles upon 
my knee, 
And I can feel his light breath 
come and go, 
I think of one (Heaven help and 
pity me !) 
Who loved me, and whom I loved, 
long ago. 



464 



MTNOR POEMS 



Who might have been . . . ah, what 
I dare no: think ! 
We all are clianged. God judges 
for ns best. 
God help us do our duty, and not 
shrink, 
And ti-ust in heaven humbly for 
the rest. 

But blame us women not, if some 
appear 
Too cold at times ; and some too 
gay and light. 
Some griefs gnaw deep. Some woes 
are hard to boar. 
Who knows the Past ? and who 
can judge us right? 

Ah, were we judged by what we 
might have been. 
And not by what Ave are, too apt 
to fall'! 
My little child — he sleeps and smiles 
between 
These thoughts ; n^l me. In 
heaven we shall know all ! 



JUDICIUM PARIDIS. 

I SAID, when young, " Beauty's the 
supi-eme joy. 
Her I will choose, and in all forms 

will face her ; 
Eye to eye, lip to lip, and so em- 
brace her 
With my whole heart." I said this 
being a boy. 

" First, I will seek her, — naked, or 
clad only 
In her own godhead, as I know of 

yore 
Great bards beheld her." So by 
si>a and shore 
I soxight her, and among the moun- 
tains lonely. 

" There be great sunsets in the won- 
drous AVest ; 
And marvel in the orbings of the 
moon : 



And glory in the jubilees of June; 
And power in the deep ocean. For 
the rest, 

" Green-glaring glaciers ; purple 
clouds of pine 
White walls of ever-roaring cata- 
racts ; 
Blue thunder drifting over thirsty 
tracts ; 
The homes of eagles ; these, too, are 
divine, 

" And terror shall not daunt me — so 
it be 
Beautiful — or in storm or in 

eclipse : 
Rocking pink shells, or wrecking 
freighted ships, 
I shall not shrink to find her in the 
sea. 

" Next, I will seek her — in all shapes 
of wood, 
Or brass, or marble ; or in colors 

clad ; 
And sensuous lines, to make my 
spirit glad. 
And she shall change her dress with 
every mood. 

" Rose-latticed casements, lone in 
summer lands — 
Some witch's bower : pale sailors 

on the marge 
Of magic seas, in an enchanted 
barge 
Stranded, at sunset, upon jewelled 
sands : 

"White nymphs among the lilies: 
shepherd kings : 
And pink-hooved Fawns : and 

mooned Endymioiis : 
From every channel through which 
Beauty runs 
To fertilize the world with lovely 
things. 

" I will draw freely, and be satisfied. 
Also, all legends of her apparition 



MINOR POEMS. 



46s 



To men, in earliest times, in each 
condition, 
I will inscribe on portraits of my 
bride. 

'• Then, tliat no single sense of her 
be wanting, 
Music ; and all voluptuous com- 
binations 
Of sound, with their melodious 
palpitations 
To charm the ear, the cells of fancy 
haunting. 

" And in her courts my life shall be 
outrolled 
As one unfurls some gorgeous 

tapestry. 
Wrought o'er with old Olympian 
heraldry. 
All purple-woven stiff with blazing 
gold. 

And I Avill choose no siglit for 

tears to flow : 
I will not look at sorfow : I will 

see 
Nothing less fair and fuli of 

majesty 
Than young Apollo leaning on liis 

bow. 

" And I will let things come and go: 
nor range 
For knowledge : but from mo- 
ments pluck delight. 
The while the great days ope and 
shut in light, 
And wax and wane about me, rich 
with change. 

Some cup of dim hills, where a 

white moon lies, 
Dropt out of weary skies without 

a breath, 
In a great pool : a slumbrous vale 

beneath ; 
And blue damps prickling into white 

fire-flies : 



"Some sunset vision of an Oread, 
less 
Than half an hour ere moonrise 

caught asleep 
With a flusht cheek, among crusht 
violets deep, — 
A warm half-glimpse of milk-white 
nakedness, 

" On sumptuous summer eves: shall 
Avake for me 
Rapture from all the various stops 

of life : 
Making it like some charmed Ar- 
cadian fife 
Filled by a wood-god with his 
ecstasy." 

These things I said while I was yet 
a boy, 
And the world showed as between 

dream and waking 
A man may see the face he loves. 
So, breaking 
Silence, I cried ..." Thou art the 
supreme Joy 1" 

My spirit, as a lark hid near the sun, 
Carolled at morning. But ere 

slie had dropt 
Half down the rainbow-colored 
years that propped 
Her gold cloud up, and broadly, one 
by one 

The world's great harvest-lands 
broke on her eye, 
She changed her tone, . . . "What 

is it I may keep ? 
For look here, how the merry 
reapers reap : 
Even cliildren glean : and each puts 
something by. 

" Tlie pomps of morning pass r 
when evening comes. 
What is retained of these which I 

may show ? 
If for the hills I leave the fields 
■ below 
I fear to die an exile from men's 
homes. 



466 



MINOR POEMS. 



"Though here I see the orient 
pageants pass, 
I am not richer than the merest 

hind 
That toils helow, all day, among 
his kind, 
And clinks at eve glad horns in the 
dry grass." 

Then, pondering long, at length I 
made confession. 
" I have erred much, rejecting all 

that man did : 
For all my pains I sliall go empty 
lianded ; 
And Beauty, of its nature foils pos- 
session." 

Thereafter, I said ..." Knowledge 
is most fair. 
Surely to know is better than to 

see 
To see is loss : to know is gain : 
and we 
Grow old. I will store thriftily, with 
care." 

In which mood I endured for many 
years. 
Valuing all things for their further 

uses : 
And seeking knowledge at all 
open sluices ; 
Thougli oft the stream turned brack- 
ish with my tears. 

Yet not the less, for years in this 
same mood 
I rested : nor from any object 

turned 
That had its secret to be spelled 
and learned, 
Mui-muring ever, " Knowledge is 
most good." 

Unto which end I shunned the 
revelling 
And ignorant crowd, that eat the 

fruits and die : 
And called out Plato from his 
century 
To be my helpmate : and made 
Homer sing. 



Until the awful Past in gathered 
heaps 
Weighed on my brain, and sunk 

into my soul. 
And saddened through my nature, 
till the whole 
Of life was darkened downward to 
the deeps. 

And, wave on wave, the melancholy 
ages 
Crept o'er my spirit : and the 

years displaced 
The landmarks of the days : life 
waned, effaced 
From action by the sorrows of the 
sages : 

And my identity became at last 
The record of those others : or, if 

more, 
A hollow shell the sea sung in : a 
shore 
Of footprints which the waves 
washed from it fast. 

And all was as a dream whence, 

holding breath. 
It seemed, atT times, just possible to 

break 
By some wild nervous effort, with 

a shriek, 
Into the real world of life and death. 

But that thought saved me. Through 
the dark I screamed 
Against tlie darlvuess, and the 

darkness broke. 
And broke tliat nightmare : back 
to life I woke, 
Thougli weary with tlie dream 
wliich I had dreamed. 

O life ! life ! life ! With laughter 
and with tears 
I tried myself : I knew that I had 

need 

Of pain to prove that this was life 
indeed. 
With its warm privilege of hopes and 
fears. 



MINOR POEMS. 



467 



O Love of man made Life of man, 
that saves ! 
O man, that standest looking on 

the light ; 
That staudest on the forces of the 
night r 
That staudest up between the stars 
and graves ! 

O man ! by man's dread privilege of 
pain, 
Dare not to scorn thine own soul 

nor thy brother's : 
Though thou be more or less than 
all the others. 
Man's life is all too sad for man's dis- 
dain. 

The smiles of seraphs are less awful 
far 
Tlnan are the tears of this human- 
ity, 
That sound, in dropping, through 
Eternity, 
Heard in God's ear beyond the 
furthest star. 

If that be true, — the hereditary hate 
Of Love's lost Kebel, since the 

worlds began, — 
The very Fiend, in hating, honors 
Man : 
Flattering with Devil-homage Man's 
estate. 

If two Eternities, at strife for us. 
Around each hivman soul wage 

silent war. 
Dare we disdain ourselves, though 
fall'n we are. 
With Hell and Heaven looking on 
us thus ? 

Whom God hath loved, whom Devils 
dare not scorn. 
Despise not thou, — the meanest 

liuman creature. 
Climb, if thou canst, the heights 
of thine own nature, 
And look toward Paradise where 
each was born. 



So I spread sackcloth on my former 
pride : 
And sat down, clothed and covered 

up with shame : 
And cried to God to take away my 
blame 
Among my brethren : and to these 
I cried 

To come between my crime and my 
despair, 
That they might help my heart up, 

When God sent 
Upon my soul its proper punish- 
ment, 
Lest that should be too great for me 
to bear. 

And so I made my choice : and 
learned to live 
Again, and worship, as my spirit 

yearned : 
So much had been admired — so 
much been learned — 
So much been given me — O, how 
much to give ! 

Here is the choice, and now the 
time, O chooser ! 
Endless the consequence though 

brief the choice. 
Echoes are waked down ages by 
thy voice : 
Speak : and be thou the gainer or 
the loser. 

And I bethought me long . . . 
•' Though garners split. 
If none but thou be fed art thou 

more full ? " 
For surely Knowledge and the 
Beautiful 
Are human ; must have love, or die 
for it ! 

To Give is better than to Know or 

See: 
And both are means : and neither 

is the end : 
Knowing and seeing, if none call 

thee finend. 
Beauty and knowledge have done 

naught for thee. 



46S 



MWOR POEMS. 



Though I at Aphrodite all day long 
Gaze until sunset with a thirsty 

eye, 
I shall not drain her boundless 
beauty dry 
By that wild gaze : nor do her fair 
face wrong. 

For who gives, giving, doth win back 
his gift : 
And knowledge by division grows 

to more : 
Who hides the Master's talent 
shall die poor. 
And starve at last of his own thank- 
less thrift. 

I did this for another : and, behold ! 
My work hath blood in it : but 

thine hath none : 
Done for thyself, it dies in being 
done : 
To what thou buyest thou thyself 
art sold. 

Give thyself utterly away. Be lost. 
Choose someone, some thing : not 

thyself, thine own : 
Thou canst not perish : but, thrice 
greater grown. — 
Thy gain the greatest where thy loss 
was most, — 

Thou in another shalt thyself new- 
find. 
The single globule, lost in the wide 

sea. 
Becomes an ocean. Each iden- 
tity 
Is greatest in the greatness of its 
kind. 

Who serves for gain, a slave, by 
thankless pelf 
Is paid ; who gives himself is 

priceless, free. 
I give myself, a man, to God : lo, 
He 
Benders me back a saint unto my- 
self I 



NIGHT. 

Come to me, not as once thou 
earnest. Night ! 

With light anil splendor up the 
gorgeous West ; 

Easing the heart's rich sense of 
thee with sighs 

Sobbed out, of all emotion on 
Love's breast ; 

While the dark world waned wav- 
ering into rest, 
Half seen athwart the dim delicious 
light 

Of languid eyes : 

But softly, soberly ; and dark — more 
dark ! 
Till my life's shadow lose itself in 
thine. 
Athwart the light of slowly- 
gathering tears. 
That come between me and the 

starlight, shine 
From distant melancholy deeps 
divine, 
While day slips downward through a 
rosy ai"c 
To other spheres. 

SONG. 

Flow, freshly flow, 

Dark stream, below ! 

While stars grow light above : 

By willowy banks, through lonely 

downs, 
Past terraced walls in silent towns, 
And bear me to my love ! 

Still, as we go, 

Blow, gently blow. 

Warm wind, and blithely move 

These dreamy sails, that slowly 

glide, — 
A shadow on the shining tide 
That bears me to my love. 

Fade, sweetly fade 
In dewy shade 
On lonely grange and grove, 
O lingering day 1 and bring the 
night 



__l 



MINOR POEMS. 



469 



Through all lier milk-white mazes 

blight 
That tremble o'er my love. 

The sunset wanes 

From twinkling panes. 

Dim, misty myriads move 

Down glimmering streets. One light 

I see — 
One happy light, that shines for me, 
An J lights me to my love ! 



FOKBEAEANCE. 

Call me not, Love, unthankful or 
unkind. 
That I have left my heart with 
thee, and fled. 
I were not worth tliat wealth whicii 
I resigned, 
Had I not chosen poverty instead. 

rjrant me but solitude ! I dare not 
swerve 
From my soul's law, — a slave, 
though serving thee. 
I but forbear more grandly to de- 
serve : 
The free gift only cometh of the 
free. 

HELIOS HYPERIONIDES. 

Helios all day long his allotted 
labor pursues ; 
No rest to his passionate heart and 
his panting horses given, 
From the moment when roseate-fin- 
gered Eos kindles the dews 
And spurns the salt sea-floors, 
ascending silvery the heaven. 
Until from the hand of Eos Hesperos, 
trembling, receives 
His fragrant lamp, and faint in the 
twilight hangs it up. 
Then the over-wearied son of Hyper- 
ion lightly leaves 
His (lusty chariot, and softly slips 
into his golden cup : 
And to holy ^Ethiopia, under the 

ocean-stream, 



Back from the sunken retreats of 
the sweet Hesperides, 
Leaving his unloved labor, leaving 
his unyoked team. 
He sails to his much-loved wife ; 
and stretches his limbs at ease 
In a laurelled lawn divine, on a bed 
of beaten gold, 
\Yliere he pleasantly sleeps, forget- 
ting his travel by'lands and seas, 
Till again the clear-eyed Eos comes 
with a finger cold. 
And again, from his white wife 
severed, Hyperionides 
Leaps into his flaming chariot, 
angrily gathers the reins. 
Headlong flings his course through 
Uranos, much in wrath. 
And over the seas and mountains, 
over the rivers and plains, 
Chafed at heart, tumultuous, 
pushes his burning path. 



ELISABETTA SIRANL 

1665. 

Just to begin, — and end ! so much, — 
no more ! 
To touch upon the very point at 
last 
Where life should cling : to feel the 
solid shore 
Safe ; where, the seething sea's 
strong toil o'erpast. 
Peace seemed appointed ; then, with 
all the store 
Half-undivulged of the gleaned 
ocean cast. 
Like a discouraged wave's on the 
bleak strand. 
Where what appeared some temple 
(whose glad Priest 
To gather ocean's sparkling gift 
should stand. 
Bidding the wearied wave, from 
toil releast. 
Sleep in the marble harbors bathed 
with bland 
And quiet sunshine, flowing froi^ 
full east 



Among the laurels) proves the dull 
blind rock's 
Fantastic front, — to die, a disal- 
lowed, 
Dasht pui-pose : which the scornful 
shore-cliff mocks. 
Even as it sinks ; and all its 
wealth bestowed 
In vain, — mere food to feed, per- 
chance, stray flocks 
Of the coarse sea-gull ! weaving its 
own shroud 
Of idle foam, swift ceasing to be 
seen ! 
— Sad, sad, my father ! . . . yet it 
I comes to this. 

I For I am dying. All that might 
have been — ' 

That must have been ! • . . the 
days, so hard to miss, 
So sure to come ! . . . eyes, lips, 
that seemed to lean 
In on me at my work, and almost 
kiss 
The curls bowed o'er it, . . . lost I 
O, never doubt 
1 should have lived to know them 
all again, 
And from the crowd of praisei-s 
single out 
For special love those forms be- 
held so plain 
Beforehand. When my pictures, 
borne about 
Bologna, to the church doors, led 
tlioir train [go. 

Of kindling faces, turned, as by they 
Up to these windows, — standing at 
your side 
Unseen, to see them, I (be sure !) 
should know 
And welcome back tliose eyes and 
lips, descried 
Long since in fancy : for I loved 
them so, 
And so believed them ! Think ! 
. . . Bologna's pride 
My paintings ! . . . Guido Reni's 
mantle mine . . . 
And I, the maiden artist, prized 
^mong 



The masters, . . . ah, that dream 
was too divine 
For earth to realize ! I die so 
young. 
All this escapes me ! God, the gift 
be Thine, 
Not man's then . . . better so ! 
That throbbing throng 
Of human faces fades out fast. Even 
yours. 
Beloved ones, the inexorable Fate 
(For all our vowed affections I) scarce 
endures 
About me. Must I go, then, deso- 
late 
Out from among you ? Nay, my 
work insures 
Fit guerdon somewhere, — though 
the gift must wait ! 
Had I lived lo'nger, life would sure 
have set 
Earth's gift of fame in safety. But 
I die. 
Death must make safe the heavenly 
guerdon yet. 
I trusted time for immortality, — 
There was my error ! Father, never 
let 
Doubt of rewai'd confuse my 
memory ! 
Besides, — I have done much : and 
■what is done 
Is well done. All my heart con- 
ceived, my hand 
Made fast . . . mild martyr, saint, 
and weeping nun. 
And truncheoned prince, and war- 
rior with bold brand. 
Yet keep my life upon them ; — as 
the sun. 
Though fallen below the limits of 
tiie land. 
Still sees on every form of purple 
cloud 
His painted presence. 

Flaring August's here, 
September's coming ! Summer's 
bi'oidered shroud 
Is borne away in triumph by the 
year ; 



MINOR POEMS. 



47t 



Red Autumn drops, from all his 
branches bowed. 
His careless wealth upon the costl}- 
bier. 
We must be cheerful. Set the case- 
ment wide. 
One last look o'er the places I have 
loved. 
One last long look ! . . . Bologna, O 
my pride 
Among thy palaced streets ! The 
days have moved 
Pleasantly o'er us. What has been 
denied 
To our endeavor ? Life goes un- 
reproved. 
To make the best of all things, is the 
best 
Of all means to be happy. This I 
know, 
But cainiot phrase it finely. The 
night's rest 
The day's toil sweetens. Flowers 
are warmed by snow. 
All's well God wills. AVork out this 
grief. Joy's zest 
Itself is salted with a touch of 
woe. 
There's nothing comes to us may 
not be borne, 
Except a too great happiness. But 
this 
Comes rarely. Though I know that 
you will mourn 
The little maiden helpmate j^ou 
must miss, 
Thanks be to God, I leave you not 
forlorn. 
Thei'e should be comfort in this 
dying kiss. 
Let Barbara keep my colors for her- 
self. 
I'm sorry that Lucia went away 
In some unkindness. 'Twas a 
cheerful elf ! 
Send her my scarlet ribands, 
mother ; say 
j I thought of her. My palette's on 
! the shelf, 

iMrprised, no doubt, at such long 
holiday. 



In the south window, on the easel, 
stands 
My picture for the Empress Elea- 
nore. 
Still wanting some few touches, thesa 
weak hands 
Must leave to others. Yet there's 
time before 
The year ends. And the Empress' 
own commands 
You'll find in writing. Barbara's 
brush is more 
Like mine than Anna's ; let her 
finish it. 
O, . . . and there's * Maso, our 
poor fisherman ! 
You'll find my work done for him : 
something fit 
To hang among his nets ; you 
liked the plan 
My fancy took to please our friend's 
dull wit, 
Scarce brighter than his old tin 
fishing-can. . . . 
St. Margaret, stately as a ship full 
sail. 
Leading a dragon by an azure 
band ; 
The ribbon flutters gayly in the gale; 
The monster follows the Saint's 
guiding hand. 
Wrinkled to one grim smile from 
head to tail ; 
For in his horny hide his heart 
grows bland. 
— AVhere are you, dear ones ? . . . 

'Tis the dull, faint chill. 
Which soon will shrivel into burn- 



ing pam 



Dear brother, sisters, fatlnr, mother, 
—still 
Stand near me! While your faces 
fi.\t remain 
Within my sense, vague fears of un- 
known ill 
Are softly crowded out, . . . and 
yet, 'tis vain ! 
Greet Giulio Banzi ; greet Antonio ; 
greet [gone, 

Bartolomeo, kuidly. When I'm 



472 



MINOR POEMS. 



And in the school-room, as of old, 
you meet, 
— Ah, yes! you'll miss a certain 
merry lone, 
A cheerful face, a smile that should 
complete 
The vague place in the household 
picture grown 
To an aspect so familiar, it seems 
strange 
That aught should alter there. 
Mere life, at least. 
Could not have brought the shadow 
of a change 
Across it. Safely the warm years 
increast 
Among us. I have never sought to 
range 
Fi-om our small table at earth's 
general feast. 
To higiier places: never loved but 
you. 
Dear family of friends, except my 
art : 
Nor any form save those my pencil 
drew 
E'er quivered in the quiet of my 
heart. 
T die a maiden to Madonna true. 
And Mould have so continued. . . . 
There, the smart. 
The pang, the faintness ! . . . 

Ever, as I lie 
Here, with the Autumn sunset on 
my face, 
And heavy in my curls (whilst it, 
and I, 
Together, slipping softly from the 
place 
We played in, pensively prepare to 
dfe), 
A low wann humming simmers iu 
my ears, 



— Old Summer afternoons ! faiht 
fragments rise 
Out of my broken life ... at 
times appears [skies : 

Madonna-like a moon in mellow 
The three Fates with the spindle 
and the sJiears: 
The Grand Duke Cosmo with the 
Destinies : 
St, Margaret with her dragon : fit- 
ful cheers 
Along the Via Urbana come and go: 
Bologna with her towers ! . . . 
Then ail grows dim. 
And shapes itself anew, softly and 
slow. 
To cloistered glooms through 
A\ liich the silver hymn 
Eludes me sensitive silence ; whilst 
below 
The southwest window, just one 
single, slim, 
And sleepy sunbeam, powders with 
waved gold 
A lane of gleamy mist along the 
gloom, 
Whereby to find its way, through 
manifold [tomb, 

Magnificence, to Guido Reni's 
Which, set in steadfast splendor, I 
behold. 
And all the while, I scent the in- 
cense fume. 
Till dizzy grows the brain, and dark 
the eye 
Beneath the eyelid. Wlien the 
end is come. 
There, by his tomb (our master's) let 
me lie, 
Somewhere, not too far off ; be- 
neath the dome 
Of our own Lady of the Rosary ; 
Safe, where old friends will pass ; 
and still near home I 



LAST WORDS. 473 



LAST WORDS. 

Will, are vou sitting and watching tliere yet ? And I know, by a certain 

skill" 
That grows out of utter wakefulness, the night must be far spent, Will : 
For, lying awake so many a night, I have learned at last to catch 
From the crowing cock, and the clanging clock, and the sound of the 

beating watch, 
A misty sense of the measureless march of Time, as he passes here, 
Leaving my life behind him ; and I know tliat the dawn is near. 
But you have been watching three nights, AVill, and you look so wan to- 
night, 
I thought, as I saw you sitting there, in the sad monotonous light 
Of the moody night-lamp near you, that I could not choose but close 
My lids as fast, and lie as still, as though I lay in a doze : 
For, I thought, " lie will deem I am dreaming, and then he may steal 

away. 
And sleep a little : and this will be well." And tridy, I dreamed, as I lay 
Wide awake, but all as quiet, as though, the last office done. 
They had streaked me out for the grave. Will, to which they will bear me 

anon. 
Dreamed ;for old things and places canie dancing about my brain. 
Like ghosts that dance in an empty house; and my thoughts went slipping 

again 
By green back-ways forgotten to a stiller circle of time, 
Where violets, faded forever, seemed blowing as once in their prime : 
And I fancied that you and L Will, were boys again as of old. 
At dawn on the hill-top together, at eve in tlie held by the fold ; 
Till the thought of this was growing too wildly sweet to be borne, 
And I opened my eyes, and turned me round, and there, in the light for- 
lorn, 
I find you sitting beside me. But the dawn is at hand, I know. 
Sleep a little. I shall not die to-night. You may leave me. Go. 
Eh ! is it time for the drink ? must you mix it ? it does me no good. 
But thanks, old friend, true friend ! I would live for your sake, if I could. 
Ay, there are some good things in life, that fall not away with the rest. 
And, of all best thhigs upon earth, I hold that a faithful friend is the 

best. 
For woman. Will, is a thorny flower : it breaks, and we bleed and smart : 
The blossom falls at the fairest, and the thorn runs into the heart. 
And woman's love is a bitter fruit ; and, however he bite it, or sip. 
There's many a man has lived to curse the taste of that fruit on his lip. 
But never was any man yet, as I ween, be he whosoever he may. 
That has known what a true friend is. Will, and wished that knowledge 

away. 
You were proud of my promise, faithful despite of my fall. 
Sad when the world seemed over sweet, sweet when the world turned 

gall : 
■When I cloaked myself in the pride of praise from what God grieved to see, 



474 LAST WORDS. 



You saw through the glittering lie of it all, and silently mourned for me : 
Wlien the woild took back what the world had given, and scorn with 

praise ciianged place, 
I, from my sackcloth and ashes, looked up, and saw hope glow on your 

face : 
Therefore, fair weather be yours, Will, whether it shines or pours. 
And, if I can slip from out of my grave, my spirit will visit yours. 

O woman eyes that have smiled and smiled, O woman lips that have kist 
The life-blood out of my heart, Avhy thus forever do you persist, 
Pressing out of the dark all round, to bewilder my dying hours 
With your ghostly sorceries brewed from the breath of your poison- 
flowers ? 
Still, though the idol be broken, I see at their ancient revels, 
The riven altar around, come dancing the self-same devils. 
Lente currite, lente ciirrlte, noctis eqni! 
Linger a little, O Time, and let me be saved ere 1 die. 
How many a night 'neath her window have I walked in the wind and 

rain, 
Only to look at her shadow fleet over the lighted pane. 
Alas ! 'twas the shadow that rested, 'twas herself that fleeted, you see, 
And now I am dying, I laiow it : — dying, and where is she ! 
Dancing divinely, perchance, or, over her soft harp strings. 
Using the past to give pathos to the little new song that she sings. 
Bitter ? I dare not be bitter in the few last hours left to live. 
Needing so much forgiveness, God grant me at least to forgive. 
There can be no space for the ghost of her face down in the narrow 

room. 
And the mole is blind, and the worm is mute, and there must be rest in 

the tomb. 
And just ©ne failure more or less to a life that seems to be 
(Whilst I lie looking upon it, as a bird on the broken tree 
She hovers about, ere malcing wing for a land of lovelier growth, 
Brighter blossom, and purer air, somewhere far off in the south,) 
Failure, crowning failure, failure from end to end. 
Just one more or less, what matter, to the many no grief can mend ? 
Not to know vice is viilne, not fate, however men rave : 
And, next to this I hold that man to l)e but a coward and slave 
Who bears the plague-spot about him, and. knowing it, shi'inks or fears 
To brand it out, though the burning knife should hiss in his heart's hot 

tears. 
But I have caught the contagion of a world that I never loved, 
Pleased myself with approval of those that I never approved, 
Paltered with pleasures that pleased not, and fame where no fame could 

be. 
And liow shall I look, do you think, Will, when the angels are looking 

on me ? 
Yet oh ! the confident spirit once mine, to dare and to do ! 
Take the world into my hand, and shajie it, and make it anew : 
Gather all aien in my purpose, men in their darkness and dearth. 
Men ju thejr meanness and niisery, made of the dust of the earth, 



LAST WORDS. 475 

Mould them afresh, and make out of them Man, with his spirit sublime, 
Man, the great heir of Eternity, dragging the conquests of Time I 
Therefore I mingled among them, deeming the poet should hold 
All natures saved in his own, as the world in the ark was of old ; 
All natures saved in his own to be types of a nobler race, 
When the old world passeth away, and the new world taketh his place. 
Triple fool in my folly ! purblind and impotent worm, 
. Thinking to move the world, who could not myself stand firm ! 
Cheat of a worn-out trick, as one that on shipboard roves 
Wherever the wind may blo\v, still deeming the continent moves ! 
Blowing the frothy bubble of life's brittle purpose away ; 
Child, ever chasing the morrow, who now cannot ransom a day : 
Still I called Fame to lead onward, forgetting she follows behind 
Those who know whither they walk through the praise or dispraise of 

mankind. 
All my life (looking back on it) shows like the broken stair 
That winds round a ruined tower, and never will lead anywhere. 
Friend, lay your hand in my own, and swear to me, when you have seen 
My body borne out from the door, ere the grass on my'grave shall be 

green, 
You will burn every book I have written. And so perish, one and all, 
Each trace of the struggle that failed with the life that I cannot recall. 
Dust and ashes, earth's dross, which the mattock may give to the mole ! 
Something, though stained and defaced, survives, as I trust, with 'he 

soul. 

Something ? . . . Ay, something comes back to me . . . Think ! that I 
might have been . . . what ? 

Almost, i fancy at times, what I meant to have been, and am not. 

Where was the fault ? Was it strength fell short ? And yet (I can speak 
of it now ]) 

How my spirit sung like the resonant nerve of a warrior's battle-bow 

When the shaft has leapt from the string, what time, her first bright ban- 
ner unfurled. 

Song aimed her arrowy purpose in me sharp at the heart of the world. 

Was it the hand that faltered, unskilled ? or was it the eye that deceived ? 

However I reason it out. there remains a failure time has not retrieved. 

I said I would live in all lives that beat, and love in all loves that be : 

I would crown me lord of all passions ; and the passions were lords of 
me. 

I would compass every circle, I would enter at every door, 

In the starry spiral of science, and the labyrinth of lore, 

Only to follow the flying foot of love to his last retreat. 

Fool ! that with man's all-imperfect would circumscribe God's all-com- 
plete ! 

Arrogant error ! whereby I starved like the fool in the fable of old, 

Whom the gods destroyed by the gift he craved, turning all things to gold. 

Be wise : know what to leave unknown. The flowers bloom on the brink, 

But black death lurks at the bottom. Help men to enjoy, not to think, 

O poet to whom I give place ! cull the latest effect, leave the cause. 

few that dive for the pearl of the deep but are crushed in the kraken's jaws, 



476 LAST IVORDS. 



While the harp of Arion is heard at eve over the 2;liminoring ocean : 

He floats in the foam, on tlie dauphin's baclv, gliding with gentle motion, 

Over the rolling water, under the light of the beaming star. 

And the nymphs, half asleep on the surface, sail moving his musical car, 

A little knowledge will turn youth gray. And I stood, chill in the sun, 

Naming you eacii of the roses ; blest by the beauty of none. 

My song had an after-savor of the salt of many tears, 

Or it burned with a bitter foretaste of the end as it now appears : 

And the world that had paused to listen awhile, because the first notes 

Avere gay. 
Passed on its way wi Ih a sneer and a smile : " Has he nothingfresher to say ? 
This poet's mind was a weedy flower that presently comes to naught !" 
For the world was not so sad but what my song Avas sadder, it thought. 
Comfort me not. For if aught be worse than failure from over-stress 
Of a life's prime purpose, it is to sit down content with a little success. 
Talk not of genius baffled. Genius is master of man. 
Genius does what it must, and talent does what it can. 
Blot out my name, that the spirits of Shakespeare and Milton and Burns 
Look not down on the praises of fools with a pity my soul yet spurns. 
And yet, had I only the trick of an aptitude shrewd of its kind, 
I should have lived longer, I think, more merry of heart and of mind. 
Surely I knew (who better ?) the innermost secret of each 
Bird, and beast, and flower. Failed I to give to them speech ? 
All the pale spirits of storm, that sail down streams of the Avind, 
Cleaving the thunder-cloud, Avith Aviid hair bloAving behind ; ' 
All the soft seraphs that float in the lignt of the crimson eve. 
When Hesper begins to glitter, and the heavy Avoodland to heave : 
All the Avhite nyniphs of the Awater tliat dAvell 'mid the lilies alone : 
And the buskined maids for the love of Avhora the hoary oak-trees groan ; 
They came to ]ny call in the forest ; they crept to my feet from the river : 
They softly looked out of the sky Avhen I sung, and their Avings beat Avith 

breathless endeavor 
The blocks of the broken thunder piling their stormy lattices, 
Over the moaning mountain Avails, and over the sobbing seas. 
So many more reproachful faces around my bed ! 

Voices moaning about me : " Ah ! couldst thou not heed what Ave said ? " 
Peace to the past ! it skills not noAV : these thouglits that vex it in vain 
Are but the dust of a broken purpose bloAvn about the brain 
Which presently Avill bo tenantless, Avhen the Avanton AA-orms carouse, 
And the mole builds OA'er my bones his little AvindoAvless house. 
It is growing darker and stranger. Will, and colder, — dark and cold. 
Dark" and cold ! Is the lamp gone out ? Give me thy hand to hold. 
No : 'tis life's brief candle burning doAvn. Tears ? tears. Will ! Why, 
This whi("h Ave call dying is only ceasing to die. 
It is but the giving over a game all lose. Fear life, not death. 
The hard thing Avas to live^ Will. To whatever bourn this breath 
Is going, the A\-ay is easy noAv. With flowers and music, life. 
Like a" pagan sacrifice, leads us along to this dark High Priest Avith the 

knife 
J have been too peevish at mere mischance, For Avhether we bujlcl it, 

friend. 



LAST WORDS. 477 



Of brick or jasper, life's large base dwindles into this point at the end, 
A kind of nothing ! Who knows whether 'tis fittest to weep or laugh 
At those thin ciulains the spider spins o'er each dusty epitaph ? 
I talk wildly. But this I know, that not even the best and first, 
When all is done, can claim by desert what even to the last and worst 
Of us weak workmen, God from the depth of his infinite mercy giveth. 
These bones shall rest in peace, for I know that my Redeemer liveth. 
Doubtful images come and go ; and I seem to be passing them by. 
Bubbles these be of the mind, which show that the stream is hurrying nigh 
To the home of waters. Already I feel, in a sort of still sweet awe. 
The great main current of all that I am beginning to draw and draw 
Into perfect peace. I attain at last I life's a long, long reaching out 
Of the soul to something beyond her. Now comes the end of all doubt. 
The vanishing point in the picture ! I have uttered weak words to-night, 
And foolish. A thousand failures, what are these in the sight 
Of the One All-Perfect who, whether man fails in his work, or succeeds, 
Builds surely, solemnly up from our broken days and deeds 
The infinite purpose of time. We are but day-laborers all. 
Early or late, or first or last at the gate in the vineyard wall. 
Lord ! if, in love, though fainting oft, I have tended thy gracious Vine, 
O, quench the thirst on these dying lips. Thou, who pourest the wine ! 
Hush ! I am in the way to study a long, long silence now. 
I know at last what I cannot tell : I seewhat I may not show. 
Pray awhile for my soul. Then sleep. There is nothing in this to fear. 
I shall sleep into death. Night sleeps. The hoarse wolf howls not near, 
No dull owl beats the casement, and no rough bearded star 
Stares on my mild departure from yon dark window bar. 
Nature takes no notice of those that are coming or going. 
To-morroAv make ready my grave, Will. To-morrow new flowers will be 
blowing. 



L 



INDEX 



[The titles In capital letters are those of the principal divisions of the work ; those 
in lower-case are single poems, or the subdivisions of long poems.] 



Adieu, IMignonne, nia Belle 234 

Adon 4()l 

A lEntresol , 213 

Aloe, The 238 

A ppearances 453 

APPLE OF LJFE, THE 102 

Aristocracy 462 

Artist, The 421 

Associations 440 

A starte 222 

-At her Casement 442 

At Home after the Ball 225 

At Home during the Ball 224 

Au Cafe * * * 22(5 

Autumn 255 

Aux Italiens 218 

Babylonia 24S 

Bird at Sunset, A 4(;2 

Bluebeard 2C8 



Eros 189 

Euthanasia 289 

Evening 461 

Evening in Tuscany, An 443 

Fancy, A 193 

Failure 286 

Farewell, A 443 

Fatality 187 

Fntima 269 

Forbearance 469 

Fount of Truth, The 242 

Fugitive, The 271 

Ghost Story, A 267 

Going back again 269 

Good-Night in the Porch 397 

Heart and Nn ture. The 251 

Helios Hvperionides 409 

How the Song was made 454 



Canticle of Love, The 265 In Travel 

" Carpe Diem " 241 Indian Love-Song 

Castle of King Macbeth, The 269 1 

Chain to wear, A L05 Jacqueline 

Change 204 Judicium Paridis 

Changes 4(i3 

Chess-Board, The 231 King Hermandiaz 

Cloud. The 191 King Linios 

CLVTE.MNESTRA 348 Khig Solomon 

Compensation 230 

Condemned Ones 200 Last ^Message, The 

Contraband 4G0 j Last Remonstrance, The 

Cordelia .. 281 Last Time that I met Lady Kuth, The. 



Count Kinaldo Kinaldi 207 

Deatli-in-Life 270 

Death of King Hacon, The 240 

Desire ISO 

Dream, A 279 

Earl's Return, The 403 I 

Elayne Le Blanc 447 

Elisabetta Siraui 409 

Epilogue. I 

Part T 209 

Part II 302 

PartUI 306 



Last Words 

Leoline 

Leatless Hours 

Letter to Cordelia, A. 

Love-Letter, A 

LUCILE 



463 
190 

256 
464 

459 
270 
279 

209 
232 
245 
473 
457 
255 
285 
197 
7 



IMadame la IMarquise 216 

Magic Land, The 185 

IMacroniicros 259 

Matrimonial Counsels 240 

" Medio de Foute Leporum " 240 

Meeting again 441 

Mermaideu, The 442 

(479) 



Metempsychosis 267 

Midges..". 243 

MINOU POEMS 434 

Misaiithiopos 287 

Morning and Meeting 190 

Mystery 260 

N;eni:e 353 

Neglected Heart, The 453 

News 207 

Kiglit 468 

Niglit in the Fisherman's Hut, A 

Part I. The Fisherman's J )augh- 

ter 273 

Part II. The Legend of Lord Ko- 

sencrantz 27£ 

Part III. Daybreak 277 

Part IV. Breakfast 278 

Novel, '1 he 217 

North Sea, The 272 

On my Twenty-fourth Year 255 

On the Sea 210 

Once 194 

Parting of Launcelot and Guenerere, 

The 434 

Pedler, 'J'he 265 

Portrait, The 221 

Prayer, A 2X8 

'■ Prensns in JEgseo 212 

Progress 220 

Prophet. The 461 

Psalm of Confession, A 294 

Queen Guenevere 452 

Quiet Moment, A 252 

Remembrance, A 215 

Reqniescat 299 

Retrospections 454 

Root and Leaf 192 

Ruined Palace, The 455 

Seaside Song'\ 1 445 

II ... 446 

See-Saw 247 

Shore. The 27 1 

Silence 206 

Since 195 

SnmllPeople 267 

Song 232 

Song 445 

Soug 459 



Song 468 

Sorcery 234 

Scjul's Loss, A 418 

Soul's Science, The 294 

Spring and Winter 458 

Storm, The 201 

Summer-Time that was. The . 446 

Sunset Fancy, A 440 

Swallow, The 446 

TANNHAUSER 312 

Terra Incognita 214 

To 452 

To Cordelia 283 

To Mignonne 235 

To the Queen of Serpents 268 

TRANSLATIONS FROM PETER 
RONSARD. 
" Voici le Bois que ma Saincte An- 

gelette " 237 

" Cache cour cette Nuict " 237 

" Page suy Moy " 237 

"Les Kspices sont k Ceres" 238 

" Ma Douce Jouvence " 238 

Vampire, The 203 

\'enice 209 

Vision, A 188 

Vision of Virgins, A 455 

Voice across my Spirit falls. Thy 454 

WANDERER, THE 

Dedication. To J. F 172 

Proh.gue 

Part I. 174 

Part II 179 

Part III 181 

Book I. In Italy 185 

Book II. In France 212 

Book III. In England 238 

Book IV. In Switzerland 251 

Book V. In Holland 255 

Book VI. Palingenesis 288 

Epilogue. 

Part 1 299 

Part II 302 

Part III 306 

Want 462 

. W^arnings 192 

Wealth 462 

Wife's Tragedy, The 424 

" Ye seek Jesus of Nazareth which 
was crucitied." 282 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



014 528 229 9 



